Trailer for the innkeepers
West's "direction" kept getting in the way. Liked the character, the premise, all the interactions. A huge yay to the first half, big nay to the second. I wish I could split my vote on this one. His affection for Sara Paxon shines through the smart-ass sarcasm without coming across as too sentimental. I love hanging out with the characters (or character in House of the Devil's case). I love the first two-thirds of Ti West's last two movies. I re-watched this last night and enjoyed it more than I did the first time. The Haunting sort of told a similar story, didn't it? If anything, I'd say her dimmest moment happened as she was trying to dump the trash bag.
I don't think it was stupidity that lead to her downfall. But in a feminist twist, I guess, the seemingly fragile heroine happens to be the bravest (albeit the most naive) character between the two. Sort of the same thing can be said of Pat Healy's character, who is trying to create a paranormal website despite the fact that he doesn't believes in them, has never seen one, and would be too frightened by an encounter with one if he did. Finally she was experiencing something beyond the banal. That is, outside of the girl's horrible stupidity in the final third of the movie.īased on the conversation she had with Pat Healy and the actress, both focusing on her cluelessness regarding her future beyond working at the hotel, I'd hazard a guess that she was too fascinated by the presence of a ghost to avoid it, even though she was clearly frightened by it. That last shot is maddening in its throat-shoving insistence on West's debilitating love of modesty. Most damning, though, is an epilogue that should feel absolutely necessary and somehow manages to force feed us pointlessness. The best scene in this film is the utterly fascinating scene whereĬlaire sees the ghost behind Luke and West never shows it to usīut it's this great height of symbolically evocative film-making in a film where the rest is lockstep marching along stock-creepy painted lines, a resistance to any bold statements in favor of almost indulgent subtlety (problematic even in West's investment in buoyant character touches/humor, which is lovely but excessive and diluting), and the aforementioned horror geekness that is lulling instead of demanding.
His love of horror is rather quaint, and it shows in his films that are alternately fascinating and self-realized, and complacent and middling. Essentially, West just doesn't seem to be pushing himself.
TRAILER FOR THE INNKEEPERS MOVIE
Had an enjoyable but somewhat disappointing ghost movie night tonight.