Painless (2012)

(AKA Insensibles)



"Set in Catalonia, Painless weaves two stories: in one, starting during the Spanish Civil War and running through to the '60s, an asylum attempts to rehabilitate children who feel no pain, by teaching them physical suffering. In the second, in the present time, a brilliant neurosurgeon who needs a bone marrow transplant, discovers this dark past when he searches for his biological parents."

Since American horror is as dead as a zombie that's just been shot in the head, incinerated, and ground-up into ink to be used to print more articles from Lianne Spiderbaby in Fangoria, I've decided to return my attention to the European offerings as I continue my quest to find something horrific again. Sadly, for all of its beautiful camerawork and moments of brilliance, "Painless" was not what I was looking for.

Ostensibly a drama about congenital analgesia, "Painless" has much the same look and atmosphere as "American Horror Story: Asylum" but without the silly bits. It's pretty dour stuff all the way through since that's exactly what anyone should expect from a story set mostly during the various civil wars in Spain. If you've ever seen "The Devil's Backbone" (2001) or "Pan's Labyrinth" (2006), they have a similar socio-political commentary in the background. You can tell that director Juan Carlos Medina (actually an American by birth) fancies himself as the new Guillermo del Toro, but employing Luis Berdejo Arribas, the weaker writer from the "[REC]" series, hasn't helped his cause.

While the acting is to the same high standard as any of the big name Spanish movies from the last 10 years, the script leaves the characters begging to be more than two-dimensional. The highlight is seeing a now totally unrecognisable Derek de Lint from "Poltergeist: The Legacy" playing a German doctor who speaks Spanish. Minor as it is, he's the only one allowed to have any development.

"Domi-nique -nique -nique s'en allait tout simplement, routier, pauvre et chantant."

Other than the modern half of the story being a lot less interesting than the first hour of period set scenes, "Painless" becomes very rushed and contrived in its last third. Even if I had a thorough knowledge of Spanish political history, I doubt that it would make a great deal of sense, plus there are enormous plotholes.

Yes, there are real, physical plotholes rather than continuity errors or small lapses in logic that can be reasoned away. For one thing, I would love to know what the inmates of the hospital, especially Berkano (Tómas Lemarquis), get to eat during their incarceration. I know the kids are supposed to have supernatural abilities along with their inability to feel pain, but a couple of spoonfuls of soup, in one important case, couldn't keep a mouse alive! Cannibalism is suggested later on, but for five years with only one rotting corpse to feed on? Not likely, is it?

"We wants it, we needs it. Must have the precious!"

For a reasonably well-funded movie, the production values are excellent. The cinematography is competent with only a few moments where things are too dark, the sound is good, and the location covers a multitude of sins. Unfortunately, "Painless" lacks spectacle after promising so much with its admittedly CGI-enhanced opening scene.

Plodding rather than thrilling, "Painless" is worth a rental, but it's visually better than the story it delivers.

The Skin I Live In (2011)

(AKA La piel que habito)



"A brilliant plastic surgeon, haunted by past tragedies, creates a type of synthetic skin that withstands any kind of damage. His guinea pig: a mysterious and volatile woman who holds the key to his obsession."

Far be it from me to suggest that internationally acclaimed Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar copied Matt Eskandari's "Victim" (2010), but I had an overwhelming feeling of déjà vu when I watched "The Skin I Live In". Give or take a few minor details and a lot more money, they are both essentially the same story.

Apparently, the reason for the similarities is that both movies were based on "Mygale", a French crime novel by Thierry Jonquet which was first published in 1984. I don't know how true that is because I haven't read it. It still seems suspicious to me that both directors waited around sixteen years before making their adaptations, but maybe it was merely synchronism.

"The Skin I Live In" is certainly the better of the two movies dramatically although, I hasten to add, I thoroughly enjoyed "Victim" too. In fact, if really pushed on the subject, I'd have to admit that purely for entertainment value, I enjoyed "Victim" a lot more. "The Skin I Live In" is too slick somehow and there is no real horror in it apart from ideas involved in the subject matter.

One of the huge differences between "Victim" and "The Skin I Live In" is that Elena Anaya plays the transformed victim in the latter. I don't want to give away the plot too much because I know that there are still some of you who haven't seen this, but that is a very severe change which I think is done more realistically in "Victim". The captive of "Victim" also deserves what happens a lot more.

Pedro Almodóvar has admitted that he was also inspired by "Eyes Without a Face" (1960) although, in fairness, there are even bigger differences between the two stories. The homage is actually quite subtle since "The Skin I Live In" has more dramatic and tragic elements rather than horror.

The cinematography is, of course, outstanding with all the steady, well-framed scenes, that you would expect. There are still quite a few flaws because of the almost surreal nature of the situation, and possibly, because Antonio Banderas isn't all that believable as a surgeon. Antonio Banderas has a gift for being more traditionally comedic than the still very dark comedy of this movie required, but I appreciated that he played things as straight as he could.

As a "non-horror" with a horror theme, "The Skin I Live In" is a difficult film to rate overall. As just a Pedro Almodóvar movie, it's one of his better ones and very enjoyable. As a horror, it doesn't have a lot of gore or scares so it's quite weak. I'm going to rate it as "average", but the quotation marks are very important. It's a great film which simply didn't conform to the rules of the horror genre enough to score any higher.

Pitch Black (2000)

"A group of marooned space travelers struggle for survival on a seemingly lifeless sun-scorched world."

Since I had nothing better to do, I decided to rewatch "Pitch Black" for only the second time in nearly 12 years. I remembered really liking it when I first saw it, but I hated the sequel and never returned to it.

I'm not entirely sure, but I think that it was the first movie with David Twohy as a director that I ever watched. I know he wrote the screenplays for quite a few other movies, but without going through his IMDb credits, I couldn't possibly tell you what they all were. Since they probably weren't horror, I don't expect any of you even care anyway.

Anyway, having recently picked this up on DVD for $2 from the County Fair, of all places, I was feeling quite pleased with my bargain. The euphoria didn't last for more than 5 minutes past my initial purchase though and certainly didn't continue into the movie itself.

Honestly, what was I thinking? This wasn't my kind of thing or a particularly good film at all. If I'd wanted a poor man's "Aliens" clone with often shaky camerawork, at least one expletive carefully timed to be uttered every 10 minutes, and a lot of unintelligible mumbling then I probably could have watched "Alien 3" and hated it even more.

Of course, Vin Diesel as Riddick made up for a lot of the flaws by being uber cool. This was his big break in the movies, and both the sci-fi and action nerds went crazy for more of him at the time. I have to admit that the Riddick of this movie was worth every bit of the hype as well. He really did come across as dangerous yet fairly heroic with it.

It's no big surprise that as a former fan of "Farscape", I really liked Claudia Black, so she was the main attraction for watching "Pitch Black" again. I was, however, disappointed by not seeing very much of her. Whatever happened to "Farscape" anyway? It just sort of ended in mid-season as far as I remember. I also liked the grey and blue girl (not the plant one), but I'll be damned if I can remember her name now.

Just like "Farscape", there are a lot of Australians in "Pitch Black". I would guess that the movie was either filmed in Australia or had a lot of Australian funding. I didn't sit through the end credits to find out so you'll have to look those details up for yourself if you feel like it.

I can't place Radha Mitchell who played Carolyn, but I know I've seen her in something else. It's kind of sinful to ever forget somebody as sexy and beautiful as her. I'm writing this review while very tired and so will deeply regret not editing it to appear cleverer tomorrow.

The major problem I had with "Pitch Black" was that it took so long to really get started without the excuse of any character development. I couldn't tell who was who or what their roles were for at least half an hour. When I did find out, I didn't particularly care about any of the characters either.

At the 45 minute mark, the action eventually kicked-off, and the reptillian, Hammer-headed, vampire bat-like aliens were kind of great considering that they were computer generated. Then it turned into a load of much needed character development, some unnecessarily boring sci-fi nonsense, and everything slowed down yet again.

As much as I would like to blame my old TV, the lack of colour and yellow hue when everyone was out on the planet's surface was intentional, but it got really annoying. I was very pleased when night came, even though then the film suffered from being too dark and SyFy-channelly. Too many shots of bad actors looking worried at each other or arguing also got old pretty fast.

I did enjoy the creature attacks, and there was, surprisingly, some nice use of suspense, bu, with a running time of nearly two hours, "Pitch Black" was quite badly paced and overlong for what it was. The whole thing could have been done in half that time and been a lot more exciting.

The ending, which set things up for the continuation of "The Chronicles of Riddick", felt very mistimed especially after a downbeat moment delivered its punchline too early. A big bang of some kind was needed to make the movie memorable.

I'm going to rate "Pitch Black" as average even though it was slightly below. I didn't completely hate it, but unfortunately, it hasn't aged well and I didn't love it either.

Batman (1989)

"The Dark Knight of Gotham City begins his war on crime with his first major enemy being the clownishly homicidal Joker."

Back in 1989, when this movie was being shown theatrically, I had more important things on my mind such as girlfriends, boozing every weekend, and studying for my first year of University exams. I had no interest in stupid superhero movies meant for little kids, had no idea who Michael Keaton or Tim Burton were, and really didn't have much knowledge about Jack Nicholson except that he was a big name as a Hollywood actor.

It was probably at least another three years before I saw this version of "Batman" for the first time on television. I wasn't overly impressed by it either; in fact, it bored me. I tried to concentrate on it, tried to enjoy Jack Nicholson as The Joker, but, alas, I just wrote it off as a load of old crap.

Having rewatched it this afternoon, I'm still not overly impressed by Tim Burton's "Batman". Given that it's supposed to be a darker and more gothic version of the comic book, it failed miserably at being either.

For a start, Michael Keaton was all wrong for the role. I think any fool could dress up in the stiff, rubber Batman costume and make that part work, but Michael Keaton was way too inconsistent as Bruce Wayne. One minute, he was all jokey and comedic; the next, he was supposed to be resourceful and tough. There's no brooding, no sense of grief about him, and he wasn't very attractive either even for the late '80s. He looked like a dweeb.

Many people have said over the years that "Batman" was really Jack Nicholson's show all the way with Michael Keaton being little more than a supporting player. While there was an element of truth in that, the poorly worked love story between Bruce Wayne and Vicky Vale was supposed to even the balance. Michael Keaton seemed to have as much time on screen as Jack Nicholson, but, because of the lack of chemistry between him and the rather plain-looking Kim Basinger, none of it was particularly memorable. The Joker's side of the story (and his character) was simply a lot more interesting.

Apart from the quite powerful music by Danny Elfman and the look of the movie, there really wasn't a lot to praise in "Batman". Any of the other actors' performances were either too weak or too short to even notice. While Billy Dee Williams almost stood out in a bad way as a totally miscast Harvey Dent, Michael Gough as Alfred just got lost in the maelstrom of weirdness. I'm still not entirely sure what happened to Jerry Hall either.

Jack Nicholson's more horrific and psychotic moments nearly elevated my viewing pleasure to a more adult level, but then too much early Tim Burton-ness crept in and ruined it all. There was a definite lag in the middle of the movie from around the point where The Joker decided to terrorize Vicky Vale for no good reason right up until the useless Batplane scenes. All this, coupled with the shitty pop music by Prince, should have caused me to switch "Batman" off and never return to it. I would have done too if I hadn't wanted to write this review.

When The Joker turned out to be the criminal who killed Bruce Wayne's parents, not only was it unbelievably clichéd, but I could feel my will to not kick the TV screen in slipping away. When the big clown balloons appeared looking like prototypes for things from "A Nightmare Before Christmas", I decided to start clipping my own toenails because I knew that would be more beneficial to me than what I was seeing on screen, and would also prevent me from doing what I really wanted to do with my feet.

Having stayed with it until the rather predictable and "Die Hard" inspired end, I feel like I deserve some kind of medal. I hated over 50% of "Batman" with every fibre of my being.

I hate Tim Burton, I hate Michael Keaton, I hate stupid rubber Batman suits which don't allow an actor to move his head, I hate the weather, and, most of all, right now, I really hate "Batman".

Perras (2011)

"Ten girls are suspected of committing a horrible crime, and until they confess, they won't be able to leave their school."

It's not often that I watch any Mexican films, but something about "Perras" intrigued me. I'm not sure if it was the beautiful cinematography or the mystery which wasn't revealed until the very end, but I loved every second of it.

I have no clue who the director, Guillermo Ríos, is or what he has done before, but I could tell that he was influenced by "Whispering Corridors" (1998) and "Amélie" (2001). That's no bad thing either because I love those movies. "Perras" even made me want to watch the rest of the "Whispering Corridors" series although I know that I'd be very disappointed.

There was even some similarity to "Dead Friend" (2004) which is known as "The Ghost" on Netflix. Although the plots are completely different, I think that you'll also see what I mean.

"Perras" means "female dogs" or "bitches", but I'm not sure that the latter is the best translation. The title really refers to the lowest class of Mexican girl rather than their bitchiness towards each other even though there was plenty of that going on too. Even re-translating the title as "sluts" or "wannabe sluts" might be closer to the truth yet still not entirely accurate.

As a probably completely misogynistic insight into the suggested world of Mexican teenagers, "Perras" certainly had a lot of social commentary which you can take or leave. If you also believe that "Quadrophenia" (1979) was in any way a fair representation of 1960s Britain then you'd be wrong too. I don't think that "Perras" was ever supposed to be a refection of reality, but the internal logic of the film makes it appear to be so.

Of course, the "real" critics and film students would have a field day dissecting "Perras", but that's not what I ever choose to do. I watch movies to be entertained not to have the preachiness of "Kidulthood" (2006) or even "Kids" (1995) forced into my subconscious. "Perras" was a lot more subtle than either of those pieces of nastiness even though there were certainly a couple of very shocking and bloody scenes as well.

Given that this was all in Spanish, I'm inclined to say that the acting was excellent. The really bitchy girl, Sofia (in the centre of the picture above), was outstanding, but there were no weak links at all.

I don't know the names of any of the actresses, and I have no idea of their ages, so this may make me sound like a pervert, but some of them were incredibly beautiful. They made me wish that I was at least twenty years younger and lived in Mexico so I could be rejected by all of them. Seriously, the girls in this were hot!

As for the mystery itself, it was masterfully played out. Being dropped into the middle of things (in medias res, baby!) with various flashbacks while not knowing what the "horrible crime" was until the end was an absolute joy for me. I liked all of the characters and could have watched another four hours of them if the director had chosen to do it.

"Perras" was not a movie which could ever have a sequel without going in a very different and mainstream direction, but I'd definitely like to see more of these characters as they grow up.

Like a very tasty but small-portioned meal, "Perras" left me satisfied by the quality but still wanting more. I highly recommend it.