The Unrepentant Cinephile

by Jason Coffman

  November Son (2008)

  Originally published on Film Monthly 11 February 2009

  To say that “gay horror” is an underserved genre would be a severe understatement. Despite the legions of independent horror films and independent gay and lesbian films made every year, there’s a surprisingly lack of films that fit both descriptions. Paul Etheredge’s 2004 gay slasher HellBent proved that switching the genders and orientations of the standard slasher-film cast could make even that well-worn subgenre interesting again. Sean Abley’s 2007 horror/sci-fi hybrid Socket put a gay spin on Cronenbergian body horror. I can name maybe three others– Jon Matthews’s Urbania, Bruce LaBruce’s Otto; or, Up With Dead People, and… I’m done.

  Perhaps even more rare than the gay horror film is the gay horror film sequel, which may make November Son a first. It’s the sequel to a 2005 film called October Moon written and directed by Jason Paul Collum, which seems to have flown pretty low under the radar even for an independent horror film. Which is pretty amazing since October Moon stars Judith O’Dea (aka Barbara from the original Night of the Living Dead) and Brinke Stevens (star of The Slumber Party Massacre and countless other b-horror films). October Moon apparently did well enough to merit a sequel, though, and now we have November Son.

  To call November Son a “horror film” may be a bit of a stretch– in the opening credits, it’s described as a “psychodrama,” which is probably closer to the mark. The opening scenes are a little confusing and overwhelming if you haven’t seen October Moon (which I haven’t), as they both bring us up to speed on the characters from the first film and kick off the storyline of the new film at the same time. And there’s a lot to cover– in October Moon, a young man named Elliot (Jerod Howard) loses everything when he realizes he’s gay. His mother Emily (O’Dea) rejects him, his fiancée Marti (Tina Ona Paukstelis) doesn’t understand and he loses his job. Worse, Elliot finds that the man he fell in love with has an obsessive ex-boyfriend whose actions turn deadly.

  As November Son opens, we discover that Emily is now a drunk, Marti is hiding out in a motel somewhere, and Elliot’s roommate and best friend Maggie (Darcey Vanderhoef) has put his old room up for rent. The new tenant is a young man named Eli (Sacha Sacket), a photographer whose life eerily mirrors that of Elliot: not only does he have a similar name and live in the same apartment, but he gets Elliot’s old job working for Emily at a Christian women’s magazine. Will the cycle of violence and obsession continue?

  Well, be prepared to wait a while for the answer to that– if there’s one deadly fault with November Son, it’s that the film’s pace is glacial. In addition, the constant flashbacks to events from the first film and the abundance of shots where someone sees Elliot when they’re really looking at Eli are exhausting. Very little happens for most of the film, other than the fact that we spend a lot of time getting to know the characters. In fact, this is something of a fault in itself: for example, we know Nancy (Stevens) well enough to know that tolerance is extremely important to her, so why does she date Eli’s creepy dad George (Lloyd Pedersen) when he vehemently disapproves of homosexuality? There’s nothing wrong with character development, but when the audience starts asking questions like this, it’s time to distract them with some action.

  Too bad there’s not much in the way of action in any sense of the word in November Son. There’s very little in the way of violence, there’s almost no sex, and the reliance on cheap jump-scares only serves to irritate rather than entertain. There are a few gruesome moments late in the film, but it seems like they would pay off even better for fans of October Moon than new audiences, who are likely to be confused for a large part of the film and who have no real emotional connection with the characters from that film who don’t carry over into the sequel.

  It’s unfortunate that November Son mostly just proves that independent gay horror can be just as meandering and frustrating as any other independent horror film. That’s not to say that there’s nothing to recommend here, though. The performances in general are pretty good, certainly a cut above most low-budget independent horror films, and there are a few genuinely creepy moments throughout the film. Still, it’s hard to recommend the film on its own terms– if you’ve seen October Moon, you’re probably the ideal audience. Anyone else might want to watch that film before giving November Son a look.

  Nude Nuns with Big Guns (2010)

  Originally published on Film Monthly 13 February 2012

  The post-Grindhouse/neo-”grindhouse” movement has resulted in a wide variety of tributes and homages to the glory days of exploitation. However, none of them have borrowed so nakedly from Tarantino and (especially) Rodriguez as Joseph Guzman’s Nude Nuns with Big Guns. From the time the first credit rolls, it is clear that Guzman is worshipping at the altar of Robert Rodriguez: even his production company’s logo calls to mind the flaming Troublemaker Studios logo! Once the film begins, any lingering doubt as to Guzman’s intentions is quickly put to rest. Surf guitar, blaring horns, freeze-frame title cards introducing each character– we’re deeply in post-Tarantino territory here. The only question is whether Nude Nuns with Big Guns brings anything new to the table to make it stand out in the crowded exploitation market.

  Sister Sarah (Asun Ortega) is traded by Father Bernardo (Maz Siam) to Chavo (David Castro) after a drug deal goes sour. Chavo gets Sarah hooked on heroin and employs her as a prostitute, where she is nearly beaten to death by the vicious Brother John (Bill Oberst, Jr.). Chavo decides Sarah is damaged goods and wants her disposed of, a task he issues to Mr. Foo (Maxie J. Santillian Jr.). Foo takes Sarah to his home, cleans her up and nurses her back to health. When she is well again, she explains to Foo that she was given a mission from God while she was on the verge of death: to clean up the church, and to kill the corrupt men and women who have turned it into a front for a powerful criminal organization involved in drugs and prostitution.

  Sarah gathers weapons and heads out on her holy mission, quickly gaining attention from powerful enemies. Father Carlittos (Perry D’Marco), nervous after hearing word of Sarah’s exploits, teams up with Chavo and his brutal gang, Los Muertos, in hopes of putting a stop to her slaughter. Sarah saves her lover Sister Angelina (Aycil Yeltan) in a raid on a church packaging drugs for distribution. All the pieces are in place for a violent struggle between one-woman army Sister Sarah and the combined forces of Los Muertos and the Catholic church, desperate to stop her before she can cripple their powerful organization. This virtually guarantees a good time, right?

  Well, no. Guzman borrows liberally from Tarantino and Rodriguez, but he also draws on some of the more unpleasant aspects of the 1970s exploitation films. There’s a reason that Tarantino and Rodriguez don’t use rape and blatant racism in the same way those films did, but Guzman apparently feels that those things are sorely missing in their formula. The film’s only black character, Kickstand (Xango Henry), seems to exist for the specific purpose of periodically raping women on Chavo’s orders. These scenes in particular give Nude Nuns with Big Guns a sleazy, mean-spirited edge that is too harshly misanthropic to be enjoyable. The film revels in cruelty throughout, and is not ridiculous or cartoonish enough to take the edge off. Playing this material straight-faced is a serious misstep, one that makes the film difficult to sit through.

  None of this is much of a surprise considering Guzman’s previous (and debut) feature was the even nastier low-budget rape/revenge flick Run! Bitch Run!. If there’s anything to be said for Nude Nuns with Big Guns, it’s that it is a definite step up technically from that film. Not that even that is saying much, given Run! Bitch Run! is an ugly, barely competent shot-on-video feature. Guzman reuses some lines from that film in Nude Nuns with Big Guns, which makes sense given that virtually everything else in the film is blatantly borrowed from somewhere else, too. The film even ends midway through Sarah’s mission– it’s amazing that there isn’t a “Volume One” tacked on to the film’s title for just one more reference to something else you’d rather b
e watching. Nude Nuns with Big Guns is nothing if not proof that if you’re going to steal from other films and filmmakers, you should make sure to steal the right stuff.

  Observance (2015)

  Originally published on Film Monthly 15 August 2016

  Since originally launching in 2012, Artsploitation Films has released a wide array of international films in the States and subtlety has not been their strong point. From confrontational and controversial sexual content to gruesome violence, the films distributed by Artsploitation have often been difficult to watch for a number of reasons. So it’s something of a pleasant surprise that one of their latest releases is a huge departure from their usual fare in that it is an extremely slow-burning psychological horror film that doesn’t rely on shock to unsettle the viewer. Joseph Sims-Dennett’s Observance is a quiet, claustrophobic horror film that leaves viewers with plenty to think about after the credits roll.

  Parker (Lindsay Farris) is a private detective who has taken his first job since the tragic accident that killed his son. It seems simple enough: he’s been hired to watch a young woman named Tenneal (Stephanie King) for a few days from an abandoned flat across the street from her apartment. Parker watches her through a telephoto lens, takes the occasional picture, jots down notes, and reports to his employer (only ever heard on the phone) when he calls. At first, the assignment is uneventful. But then a man arrives at the apartment and has what looks like a violent argument with Tenneal. Parker is disturbed by this and thinks he should intervene, but his employer insists that he continue to strictly observe. As Parker spends days in the flat, he begins to have unsettling dreams and suspects he may not be as alone as he thinks.

  Observance gets a lot of mileage out of its spare setup. The whole film takes place more or less in two locations and the immediate surroundings of the two apartments where its parallel lead characters live. Co-writers Sims-Dennett and Josh Zammit parcel out information carefully throughout the film, intentionally keeping viewers in the dark about exactly who is who and what is happening. This approach is carried out to its logical conclusion by the end of the film, by which point most viewers will probably have many more questions than answers. Some may find this frustrating, but it’s refreshing that the film’s creators are willing to trust the audience to pay careful attention to the film in order to do much of the heavy lifting in figuring out what exactly is going on.

  As nice as it is to see a film that treats its audience as intelligent, attentive viewers, it also means Sims-Dennett has to walk a careful line between giving the audience enough information to remain invested in the proceedings and keep increasing the tension that coils throughout the entire film. With its solid lead performances, carefully designed score and sound design, and an appropriately bleak look, Observance treads that line almost perfectly. There is one scene that unfortunately stretches credulity, but other than that minor issue the majority of the running time is put to good use in building steadily towards a horrific finale. Observance is the best film Artsploitation has released since last Summer’s Der Samurai, and a horror film any die-hard genre fan would do well to give a close look.

  Okja (2017)

  Originally published on Daily Grindhouse 28 June 2017

  One common complaint about Snowpiercer, Korean director Bong Joon Ho’s English-language debut, was that its bleak post-apocalyptic action also included moments of confusing absurdist humor. But the director has never shied away from comedy, and Snowpiercer has more in common with Terry Gilliam than the straight-faced Hollywood sci-fi/action cinema it superficially resembles. Whether or not it was his intent, Okja plays like a direct inverse of his last film’s tonal dynamics: it begins as a broad, goofy satire before plunging into nightmarishly gruesome territory in its second half. Its central story of the love between a young girl and her adorable giant “superpig” is very likely to scare countless youngsters with Netflix access to death—or at least into a lifetime of veganism.

  Mija (Seo-Hyun Ahn) is a teenager living with her farmer grandfather in South Korea, where they have spent the last decade raising a superpig they named Okja as part of a worldwide competition sponsored by the Mirando Corporation. Mirando, led by maniacally positive new CEO Lucy Mirando (Tilda Swinton), is trying to develop the superpig into a new resource of sustainable, ecologically-conscious meat. The superpig competition will bring the healthiest superpig to New York for a public unveiling, the first time these strange new creatures will be seen by the world at large. Unknown to Mija, Grandpa and Mirando are colluding to transport her beloved pet and best friend out of the country for the upcoming superpig parade hosted by borderline insane animal TV show star Johnny Wilcox (Jake Gyllenhaal).

  The transfer is hilariously foiled by a splinter group of the Animal Liberation Front led by Jay (Paul Dano), who have learned that the Mirando corporation is involved in sinister genetic research and their story about the origin of the superpig is a cover. The ALF have devised a complicated plan to use Okja to reveal what Mirando is really up to in their secret lab in Paramus, New Jersey. The first phase of their plan results in a sudden PR disaster for the corporation, which Lucy and the board attempt to defuse by inviting Mija to New York to reunite with Okja on-stage at the parade. But the people behind Mirando’s public façade are crumbling under the strain—Wilcox is overcome with guilt and jealousy, Lucy Mirando increasingly crippled by her own self-doubt and sabotaged by her villainous sister Nancy—and the situation is much more volatile than the ALF could have guessed.

  The opening act of Okja spends a lot of time with Mija and Okja playing in the mountains of their South Korean home, reminiscent of a live-action version of a Studio Ghibli film. Their idyllic life is interrupted by the arrival of Wilcox, and Gyllenhaal is so outlandish as to be intermittently terrifying. The tone of the film starts to shade darker even as more cartoonish characters are introduced; for example, Silver (Devon Bostick), one of the ALF members, is so committed to minimizing his environmental footprint that he refuses to eat almost anything and is malnourished as a result. But even as the broad comedy persists (including multiple gags involving Okja’s method of projectile defecation), Okja proceeds inexorably to an unavoidably dark finale. To get in the ballpark of how the film progresses, imagine if Harry and the Hendersons ended with a gruesome climax inside a Sasquatch slaughterhouse, showing every step of the process from Harry to his individual packaged parts.

  As potentially traumatic as that is, it’s also the logical endpoint of the story Bong Joon Ho and co-writer Jon Ronson establish from the beginning of the film. As outlandish as some of the characterizations are, the action of the film is grounded in a surprising realism. The cast is fantastic, which is no surprise, and there are some breathtaking set pieces. The initial “jailbreak” sequence of the ALF freeing Okja from Mirando in Seoul is jaw-dropping, a breathlessly exciting (and very funny) chase with astonishing special effects and virtuosic camera choreography. The central relationship between Mija and Okja is deeply touching, lending the finale some serious emotional gravity and gut-wrenching tension. Okja is a deft tightrope walk that continues Bong Joon Ho’s streak of excellent, singular films and one of the best films of the year so far.

  One final note: Okja was recently in the crossfire of a debate regarding films debuting on streaming services (in this case Netflix) versus opening in theaters following a controversy at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival. The festival has decreed that next year films not opening in theaters will not be allowed in competition for the Palme d’Or, a move perceived to be a direct strike against Netflix’s business model. Whether or not that is an appropriate move on the festival’s part is an entirely different conversation, but it is a shame that most audiences will never have a chance to see Okja on the big screen with an audience. It played spectacularly at its packed press screenings across the country in advance of its Netflix premiere on June 28th. Anyone who has a chance to see the film on the big screen should definitely take the opportunity and savor it.

  O
ne Eyed Girl (2014)

  Originally published on Film Monthly 11 December 2015

  Low-key psychological horror/thrillers of the 1970s have become a popular touchstone for genre filmmakers over the last few years, resulting in some critically acclaimed takes on familiar material. The best known of these may be Sean Durkin’s Martha Marcy May Marlene (2011) and Alex Ross Perry’s Queen of Earth (2015), but there have been a number of smaller films that use the same films as reference in portraying a central character’s unraveling psyche. Australian filmmaker Nick Matthews’s One Eyed Girl clearly uses some of the same reference points as some of the higher-profile psychological character studies of the last few years, although it never quite reaches the level of the best of them.

  Travis (Mark Leonard Winter) works at a mental health clinic, but after an affair with one of his former patients ends tragically he becomes unstable. On his commute to work, he takes a brochure about a support group from Grace (Tilda Cobham-Hervey), and one night his curiosity gets the better of him. The group is part of an outreach started by an Iraqi war veteran named Jay (Steve Le Marquand) who advocates a visceral approach to working out anger and pain. Jay also runs a commune, and after Travis attempts suicide he is taken there by Tom (Craig Behenna), Jay’s second-in-command. Wary and untrusting at first, Travis’s defenses fall as he comes to engage in Jay’s highly unusual forms of therapy. But after a breakthrough and a chance encounter in the woods, Travis learns that more may be at stake for him at the commune than he ever imagined.

  One thing that automatically sets One Eyed Girl apart from similar psychological thrillers is its focus on a male protagonist. Most of the well-regarded 60s and 70s films these movies take cues from featured female leads, as do many of the current films in the same style. Mark Leonard Winter is a solid actor, which is a huge point in the film’s favor since he’s on screen for nearly its entire running time. He convincingly carries Travis through a range of difficult emotions, although the opening scenes establishing his job troubles go on a little long. The lead-up to getting Travis to the commune is used to give the viewer a complete picture of what has happened to put Travis in such a dark place, but it also tips a bit too much information early on. Later scenes that explain his past in more detail feel less like revelations than covering familiar ground.