Lisa Banes – Movies of the Soul

Vampire Owl: I hope that they are not trying to find a cure for vampirism.

Vampire Bat: There is no cure to vampirism – it is a one way procedure.

Vampire Owl: It is nice that you said that. I was afraid about the same after hearing about Doctor Frankenstein‘s latest experiments.

Vampire Bat: He is just finding the cure for coffin-o-phobia.

Vampire Owl: What? Who is afraid of coffins?

Vampire Bat: I think that it is the Vampire Panda. He is such a big Kung Fu Panda, and can’t get inside any coffin.

Vampire Owl: Then where does he rest when there is the need?

Vampire Bat: He has planted a noodles tree on the backyard.

Vampire Owl: What does that achieve?

Vampire Bat: Well, our vampire experts are working on the same, an on the possibility of a noodles coffin.

[Gets three cups of elaichi tea with a piece of tea cake].

What is the movie about? :: Lockhart (Dane DeHaan), an ambitious young employee takes the place of a man who had recently suffered a heart attack while working late at work, in a large financial services company, hoping to make a big impact as early as possible. The company board members sends him to Europe to bring back the company’s CEO, Roland Pembroke (Harry Groener), from a wellness centre where he is spending his life in peace, or it is what they believe that he is doing. With the need for his presence for an upcoming company merger, as well as having someone responsible for the recent problems which have occured in the firm. This particular wellness centre is located on the Swiss side of Alps, on a picturesque location supposed to bring peace of mind, and he also finds that the villagers are not really fond of the sanatorium, and the people who visit the place, which is on the top of a hill.

So, what happens next in the movie? :: There he meets Dr. Heinreich Volmer (Jason Isaacs) as well as the other staff there, all of them not that interested in letting him meet the man whom he wants to get home as quickly as possible. He decides to come back after resting at the hotel, at a time when Pembroke is not undergoing treatment. While going down the hill, his car meets with an accident, and he is forced to go back to the wellness centre and get the needed treatment. He does manage to meet Pembroke, but it doesn’t prove to be that useful a meeting, as they are both now in treatment, and are not going to leave soon as planned – you don’t get out that easily. There, he also meets a mysterious young girl named Hannah (Mia Goth) who acts more like a child, and seems to be under the influence of Volmer, keeping on wandering around the premises. She refers to herself as a special case, unlike everyone else who are undergoing treatment at the centre.

And what follows the same in the movie? :: There is a past to the wellness centre that Lockhart learns from the patients and the people of the village. They tell the story of a baron who lived in the castle which was there in the place of the centre many years ago. The particular baron was so proud of his bloodline, and in a desire to keep the pure blood run through the family, married his own sister, an act which didn’t go well with both the villagers and the church. After finding that his sister was infertile, and he won’t be getting his heir of pure blood, he began to experiment on the peasants of the village to find a cure. Even as he is believed to have found a cure, the peasants had risen in revolt, burning the castle down, and supposed to have killed everyone including him, his wife, and the unborn child. The ruins of the castle still lies beneath the wellness centre, and Lockhart finds the need to figure it out. But he is running out of time for sure.

The defence of A Cure for Wellness :: There is one thing absolutely clear about A Cure for Wellness, and it is that the movie stays away from the usual style, and makes no attempt to stay in the safe zone, as the confort is found further away. The viewers are kept guessing, and they will all be wondering what is to happen next, until the big twist finally arrives to make the impact. There is beauty in the way things are shown, and there is the creepy effect going all through this movie with its wellness centre, maybe not that much as Crimson Peak, but is there, in a different way. With the performances, Dane DeHaan who is known the best for the Green Goblin of The Amazing Spider-Man 2, Mia Goth and Jason Isaacs compete with each other, and steal the show as a group of three. Mia Goth is just amazingly suitable for this role, which has her coming out the best way possible – those walks, and the cycle rides, and even that dance – something creepy beautiful about it. Some moments are just a lot creepy, including and more than having eels in the water and even mouth, and people suspended inside big glass containers.

The claws of flaw :: The movie certainly gets too slow in the middle, and it never really gets that pace until in the end, as there is the possibility of getting lost in the middle for those who don’t really have that much interest in this kind of a movie. There is also a certain amount of violence, which will make it not that interesting for some people. It could be disturbing for some people, but it is not that much, if you consider them as essential parts for the movie. Considering the kind of disturbing movies around, this wouldn’t come anywhere close, if you look closely. The length of the movie could have been reduced, and we can say that same about the chance for ambiguities – a two hour movie was the maximum which was needed to improve overall effectiveness. This movie was actually capable of becoming a huge horror thriller that would automatically cater to more of the viewers. Well, not everything on a divergent path is lovely, right? Watch this one, and come up with a conclusion rather than by reading reviews – for it feels personal.

How it finishes :: Along with being the interesting thriller, the movie also shows the hollowness of being rich, as those who has so much money are shown to pay even more to get better, something which even transcends foolishness at times – it is the case of humanity, isn’t it? It is easy to fool men and women who are always looking for something which is proclaimed to be better. Well, A Cure for Wellness in your usual movie, and having said that, we can also name it as one of those flicks which have a big possibility of becoming cult movies. This one is not a simple movie, and has similarities to The Institute starring James Franco and Allie Gallerani which released in the same year – there is the need for a certain kind of sense and thinking to like these kinds of movies, and as our common audience doesn’t possess the same, lets recommend it to all who are able to think differently, and let the others who decide not to think take the risk and watch the flick.

Release date: 17th February 2017
Running time: 146 minutes
Directed by: Gore Verbinski
Starring: Dane DeHaan, Mia Goth, Jason Isaacs, Adrian Schiller, Celia Imrie, Ashok Mandanna, Harry Groener, Godehard Giese, Tomas Norstrom, Magnus Krepper, Carl Lumbly, Lisa Banes, Tom Flynn, Johannes Krisch, Jason Babinsky, Angelina Hsntsch, Jeff Burrell, Annette Lober, Eric Todd, Christian Brauer, Thomas Richter, Chris Huszar, Marko Buzin

@ Cemetery Watch
✠ The Vampire Bat.

Vampire Owl :: Which girl is gone?

Vampire Bat :: No, it is the name of the movie.

Vampire Owl :: Really? But you are going to a theatre which almost froze us to death last time.

Vampire Bat :: Yes, but it happened only once.

Vampire Owl :: Dude, only a Vampire Penguin can stand such cold. I think they are trying to start a new mortuary freezer at the theatre in collabration with the nearby hospital.

Vampire Bat :: Have you ever been to a mortuary?

Vampire Owl :: Yes, once when I was looking for a zombie to provide assistance to my owlification. Couldn’t find one though. I was freezing to death; no wonder there are no zombies in this part of the world. Even the undead dies in that cold.

Vampire Bat :: But people usually want this cold.

Vampire Owl :: It is already raining outside. Why would they want more cold? See, this is why I should not watch this movie and go back to owlification. Watching a movie here would be like watching Frozen without the visual effects.

Vampire Bat :: Be the Gone Owl then. Best of luck.

[Goes into the multiplex].

What is it about? :: Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) returns home on the day of his fifth anniversary to find his wife missing. The situation does manage to find a lot of media coverage as she is daughter of the parents who wrote a very popular series of books with Amy Elliott-Dunne (Rosamund Pike) at the centre of it, called Amazing Amy. Soon, the media comes to the conclusion as he is the one who is responsible for the same and has murdered his wife, thanks to the revelations of Noelle Hawthorne (Casey Wilson) who says that he was not a good husband and she was pregnant. Nick acts strange and also sounds weird during the investigations making the cops suspect him, and there are also more evidences that point to him. Then there is his sexual relationship with Andie Fitzgerald (Emily Ratajkowski). Finding Amy’s diary and what seems to be the situation of their marriage, it becomes clear that he is in big trouble, despite the sincere efforts of his twin sister Margo Dunne (Carrie Coon) and attorney Tanner Bolt (Tyler Perry).

The defence of Gone Girl :: The movie has two sides, and the first half is entirely different from what is to follow in the second, and the PVR intermission is nicely created. The two halves are rather like two parts, with first one being an investigation of the mystery of the disappearance of a man’s wife, and the second being how it has been working for the wife, and how it goes on as everything comes together in the end. I found the second half clearly superior to the first, and there is a lot of truth as well as entertainment in the latter division. The first half’s mystery as well as the second half’s black comedy nicely compliments each other. This is comparable to the movies like The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Enemy and Prisoners with its content. It brings the questions about modern marriage to light and talks about how it has changed in the recent years – the narrative is as good as it can get, and the plot is nicely managed. There is also that power of the performances.

Positives and negatives :: I have heard some people say that the novel is better than the movie, and I do ponder about it, but I don’t think I am going to read the book any time soon. For now, I can say that the movie is excellent. Some people might find the movie’s going forward and backward in time irritating, but I find it nice. It does have a strange twist in the end, and even as it has a certain beauty about it, some viewers might find it ridiculous – yes, some other usual kind of ending could have been the one for normal audience, but we are always equipped to take something different, aren’t we? Then there is the slow start which can take the interest off you, and the extreme length of the movie which has two and half hours taken away from us, making it a total three hours long with those advertisements – too many commercials and trailers, and I was frozen in the theatre by then. Thank God for the intermission we have here, for a long English movie is not what our audience ask for.

Performers of the soul :: Ben Affleck is playing a usual unsuspecting man, and it seems to work for him a lot. There is not much to do there for him to do other than being clueless and making at attempt at being better, but he does that nicely to convince us about his character. It is undoubtedly a good role for him as we wait for him to come back to us as the new Batman. I loved how Rosamund Pike played her amazing Amy, as there is as much mystery about it as well as the awesomeness in the portrayal. There is that moment when she reveals her thoughts, and it is one bloody awesome moment, and there is that thing that he does with the climax, and she is simply perfect right there. Neil Patrick Harris is pretty much wasted in his role which is pretty much a dumb one, and does nothing much. Emily Ratajkowski is there as the most gorgeous person around, nothing more about her character, but she is indeed lovely to watch. I did think that Carrie Coon was very impressive there. Tyler Perry was nice, I liked how he did his job. Lola Kirke and Casey Wilson also do their jobs nicely.

Soul exploration :: Gone Girl is a mixture of many genres, as it has its mystery and twist along with humour and crime investigation. There is romance, but one might not want to see that genre at the centre. The movie takes more of a satirical view on the marriages of the modern age, and during the same, black humour is implemented a lot. It also shows how easy it is for the media to manipulate the public opinion and devastate a man in the most disgusting and ridiculous manner, and that it is indeed easy for the woman to put the blame on the man and frame him for her troubles, because the society will always favour a woman as long as she can keep the mask of being in trouble. There will always be at least one stupid person whom a smart one can manipulate. It gives its viewers one more reason why one shouldn’t cheat in a relationship, and your wife might be a psychopath, but you will never know. Both the protagonists are liars, and there lies the strange beauty in the narrative. May be we can put this one into the psychological thriller genre.

How it finishes :: For one second, I thought that this had released here before it did in the United States, and then on the next second, I realized that this month is not October – the time does fly so quickly, and we are indeed coming to the close of this year’s movie watching adventures in less than two months with Christopher Nolan’s already much critically acclaimed Interstellar so close to getting released. Yes, Gone Girl becomes the movie which made a difference in the closing stages, unlike those other movies which were the more awaited ones. Even as I once again almost got frozen to death in the multiplex theatre, it was worth it. Yes, this is one question that I ponder over – why is it too cold in some theatres? What is the need for the same especially when it rains almost every day here? It is a wastage – they should surely keep it low and save some energy rather than creating the mortuary freezer effect which is rather a punishment.

Release date: 31st October 2014 (India); 3rd October 2014 (USA)
Running time: 149 minutes
Directed by: David Fincher
Starring: Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike, Tyler Perry, Carrie Coon, Kim Dickens, Emily Ratajkowski, Neil Patrick Harris, Patrick Fugit, Casey Wilson, Missi Pyle, Sela Ward, Kathleen Rose Perkins, Lisa Banes, David Clennon, Scoot McNairy, Boyd Holbrook, Lola Kirke, Cyd Strittmatter, Leonard Kelly-Young