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Jenifer (2005)
Director: Dario Argento
Screenplay: Steven Weber
Based on a comic book story Jenifer by written by Bruce Jones and illustrated by Berni
Wrightson
Cast: Steven Weber as Frank
Spivey; Carrie Anne Fleming as Jenifer; Brenda James as Ruby Spivey; Harris
Allan as Pete Spivey; Beau Starr as Chief Charlie; Laurie Brunetti as Spacey
A Night of a Thousand Horror (Shows) #12
Amongst the growing list of
disappointing entries by favourite directors in this series, Dario Argento's Jenifer can be added to
them. This is neither with a sense of pain other fans of Argento's either as my
relationship to his work, past Opera
(1987) to be technically accurate, is more complicated than others who
merely look down on it all mostly. I'd argue Sleepless (2001), flaws and virtues alike, was a great later gem
and I'm not in a minority with that thankfully1. For that period in
general, the nineties is the one hazy area of Argento's career I need to view but after Sleepless I'll admit it's not been a great run. Not completely
painful to sit through but with lows like Mother
of Tears (2007) I couldn't delude myself in viewing as good.
There's still brief snippets of
the old Argento though in these later
films, like the ending of Giallo (2009),
which in amidst the bad (like Adrien
Brody in Giallo also) makes it a
far more difficult job evaluating what's happened to the quality control of Argento's filmography. Personally the
strain of resources available to Argento
as a genre filmmaker is the real issue, which ties back into his episode of Masters of Horror if one forgives a
tangent for the paragraph. Horror is in a scenario, since the 2000s, where it's
in a golden age for many but there's none of the vibrant industry in other
places where one would think it could be capitalised on. Older directors in
this series (Tobe Hooper, John Carpenter) were edged out of the
market at this point and for Argento
it was likely a even bigger mountain to climb as (arguably) the last Italian
genre filmmaker of the golden age of the industry still churning films out. Not
all of them were considered "great", but the iconic and memorable
names from the late fifties-early nineties run of Italian genre filmmaking have
mostly left or are gone. Others died as the industry also died (Lucio Fulci), retired (Sergio Martino), had to leave or go to
television directing other genres (Michele
Soavi), or ended careers shooting super low budget films elsewhere until
their deaths (Bruno Mattei in the
Philippines). Argento, one of the
best of them all, is the last of them too. He's also not someone helped by the
resources he's stuck with, the screenplays he's stuck with for later work nor
the lower budgets and increasing use of materials like CGI. A TV production
like Masters of Horror sadly doesn't
help either.
I have never read the original
comic tale Jenifer originates from,
though it does have a considerable reputation, enough to have been included in 1001 Comics You Must Read Before You Die
next to legendary titles, something whatever you think of such books is still
of considerable interest here for a medium like horror comics. The story as
adapted to screen here - another glum policeman for the series - Frank Spivey (Steve Weber) rescues a woman from being
killed in the woods only to find she's both deformed severely in the face and a
simple minded, cannibalistic entity he becomes obsessive over - doesn't come
off well with an immediate problem in the gender depiction. Inherently what
should be a fascinating tale of male obsession over women, where one figure
still yields a powerful sensuality in spite of drastic birth defects, just
evokes the misogynistic phrase involving the words "paper bag". The
script doesn't help, lead actor Weber
not a good penman as he has male characters say "subtle" dialogue
about how beautiful Jenifer is below the neck, the result of which is just the
start of how crass the story is instead of showings the innate meanings you
could draw from between the lines.
The problems have nothing to do
with actress Carrie Anne Fleming as
Jenifer mind. In fact, under heavy makeup baring one dream sequence where she's
seen without it, Fleming as an
actress I've never seen in any other production does a commendable job, the one
little slither of saving grace to an otherwise bland episode by doing something
far more rewarding than anyone else onscreen. Playing it as a adult child who
doesn't understand the difference between animal or human (even child) as
baring when jealously is involved, she does a commendable job of playing a
savant who yet welds an knowing, wanting sense of sensuality that proceeds to
scramble Spivey's mind. In the best circumstance, a story like this rather than
evoking the unfortunate misogynistic ideas I mentioned a paragraph before
should've been about the problems underlining the male heterosexual libido,
evoking not only ancient myths of female-monster hybrids that complicated men's
notions of female beauty, but more modern retellings of this issue such as Junji Ito's pitch perfect take for manga
Tomie (1987-2000) where men are
easily bended towards amorality against a figure entirely supernatural, to
which Fleming is playing her role as.
Unfortunately, as much as I view Dario
Argento as one of the best horror/mystery directors of all time, he's
clearly here not a director meant for small scale character drama especially
when it's not presenting him anything to work with baring Fleming herself.
What plays off as a psycho-sexual
drama, where an original act of kindness by the protagonist becomes a strangely
beautiful love affair, should be something worth so much more fascinating and
transgressive beyond merely nasty gore. Even when Jenifer commits atrocious
acts, Spivey gladly buries the evidence and flees with her, which could've lead
to a rewarding narrative even if it deviated away from the original text. But
the wrong person is at the helm. It's also clear the script is not good enough,
just for how obvious and crass it is before as much of the blame is on Argento as well. How else does one
explain how the immediate reaction to first meeting Jenifer leading to Spivey's
emotional state being depicted with an unfortunate choice of moment in the
episode, a change of behaviour mid-coitus with his wife later that night in the
bedroom which comes off as silly as it is eyebrow raising. As much of this is Argento too in terms of the lack of
carefulness to this material felt onscreen.
The utter lack of any of Argento's style is also felt. Even Dracula 3D (2012) has more of his touch
in comparison, which is a truly damning comment to say. Only having Claudio Simonetti, a regular
collaborator, evokes any of the old magic even if the score's far from
memorable. The production style of Masters
of Horror feels alien for a director as visual obsessed as Argento, but further enforced as well
near the end of this series is that, again, when the story's not up to snuff
there's going to be problems, even if its adaptation a stone cold classic from
another medium.
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Dance of the Dead (2005)
Director: Tobe Hooper
Screenplay: Richard Christian
Matheson
Based on a short story by Richard
Matheson
Cast: Margot Berner as Marie; Marilyn
Norry as Kate; Sharon Heath as Gerri; Jessica Lowndes as Peggy; Robert Englund
as the MC; Ryan McDonald as Boxx; Jonathan Tucker as Jak; Don MacKay as Steven
A Night of a Thousand Horror (Shows) #13
Dance of the Dead, set in a post apocalyptic world where chemical
warfare's ravaged the American infrastructure, attempts its hardest to stand
out amongst the pack. To do so, it's the most mid 2000s of the entire season in
appearance and style but it was a nice try. Shaky camera. Quick editing. Beige,
grey and washed out colours. Faux Goth and alt culture at the bar where the
title event happens, where people are half naked, bound in leather or thrashing
about to the house metal band whilst Robert
Englund's the MC for Hell in his snake-like manner and constant potty
mouth. Consider Tobe Hooper was in
his early sixties at the time of this production, it at least warmed my heart
briefly that the director I'll defend more than others was just as wild and
unhinged as he was throughout the rest of his career. I'll openly admit to
being an apologist, but Hooper's
career is much more rewarding than initially thought of after Poltergeist (1982) throughout the
eighties. Its only from Crocodile (2000)
onwards, the film where any of his trademark manic energy and style was sold
out, that the films are more difficult to defend from what I've seen, where
even The Mangler (1995) beforehand
still had a glorious derangement to it in spite of its silliness. In the
beginning it looks like Dance of the
Dead will be the same with an added advantage of trying to stand out from
the other episodes.
As a story however Dance of the Dead is bad. A tedious
drama of a young woman growing up in
post-apocalypse America going with the wrong crowd against her mother's wishes,
a drama which doesn't work due to the lack of interest in any of the
characters. The plot revolves entirely around its titular event which is
obvious from the beginning and leads to clichés of chemical experimentation and
exploitation of human life at the club. Even the title event is nothing of
particular interest, leading to nothing but actors writhing about on a stage.
The other problem, more crucial is that it relies on an emotional hook about
the protagonist's older sister throughout the narrative. This is a problem as,
baring flashbacks to a birthday party where she's a child, not as an adult, one
is not provided with the connective tissue as an adult character one needs for
her absence to effect one, thus leaving her as a disconnected non-entity. By
its end Dance of the Dead is one of
the more difficult episodes of Masters of Horror to write a lot about because
it has little to actual write about in detail. Nothing particularly stands out
as actually of interest, not even Englund
in a very sleazy role, because there's no meat to the material as an actual
story. The result after the initial rush of its tone is an immense
disappointment for me.
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(1) - If only more people could
see it nowadays though. An abrupt legal issue meant Arrow Video in the UK didn't just let the license go out of print,
but were forced to pull copies off Amazon
etc. Whatever the reason, sadly it means it's more difficult for newcomers to
the director to see the film in a decent release. Bolstered by his more
creative scenes of the 2000s, Max von
Sydow in the best performance in any Argento
film, and a killer soundtrack from the form of Goblin who reunited for that production, Sleepless has a lot to admire.
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