In honor of SeriouslyGuys’ one-year anniversary, and also in honor of the birthdays of both my mom (please don’t disown me over this) and my younger brother, this column shall take a different turn, becoming “MasterChugs March Movie Mort Month” (we’re pretty keen on alliteration over here). For five weeks, I’m going to detail to you movies that sadly just can’t make the cut of “it’s so bad, it’s good” … these movies just plain suck. First up: The Messengers.
The Messengers is the latest American horror film with a transplanted Asian director–or in this case, a directing team–at the helm, and it’s simultaneously something more and something less than other films in the cycle, like The Ring 2 and The Grudge. Directors (and brothers) Danny and Oxide (yes, that is his name) Pang have made a less gimmicky, more adult thriller than either of the Grudge flicks, and they take their time getting to the horrific moments. For most of its running time The Messengers is essentially a character study of a dysfunctional family, and the decision to carefully develop the relationships is an admirable one–theoretically, it makes the scary moments that much more frightening. The problem is that when The Messengers does finally get to the action, the story is so nonsensical that the carefully drawn characterizations are rendered meaningless.
North Dakota towns are never as quaint as they seem, especially to those newly moving into them and their farm houses. True enough, the town is peaceful and pleasant; however, the Solomons’ new house is anything but. It’s little Ben who first spots the undead inhabitants of the secluded country home. He laughs and points at things that no one else sees; horrifying creatures that crawl across the ceilings, materialize through the wallpaper and help make the beds (they even do windows!). Once the trio of specters are done with the household chores, they set their sinister sights on a more cognizant family member: Jess (Kristen Stewart).
According to the movie’s tagline, only children are susceptible to the wiles of phantoms; Jess is young enough to see them and fall prey to the creepy creatures’ clutches, yet she is old enough to understand what’s happening and to tell her parents about the haunting of their home. Unfortunately, they don’t believe her. Even after she is scratched and bruised by the beings, Roy and Denise suppose that Jess is only making these things up because she hates living on the farm. Sure, the sunflower patch is not exactly a hotbed of fun–Jess’ only friends are a laid-back local boy named Bobby (Dustin Milligan) and the affable new farmhand, John (Corbett)–but nobody could make up supernatural encounters quite this horrible for that reason alone.
So, can excellent cinematography save this movie? No. No no no no no. The acting is fourth-rate. The writing is aimless and lacks any teeth at all. The biggest problem is that the talented Pang brothers are coming to a genre that has simply run dry of ideas and the script for The Messengers lets them down at every cliched turn. There isn’t a single original concept in The Messengers, it’s all something that you’ve seen before. It’s getting to the point that these films have become the Mad Libs of horror with the same ghostly kids just changing locations and cast members. The real message to be learned from The Messengers is that audiences need something new to scare them, not the same old ghosts.
The scares in this film just aren’t all that scary or novel. There are a couple of nice creepy moments–watch closely while Penelope Ann Miller makes the bed–but, between the music telegraphing every scare ahead of time and the heavy-handed editing, the intensity soon turns to monotony. While it was wise for the story to focus on the family and to provide them with realistic problems to face outside of the supernatural threat, it was not enough to save The Messengers. Avoid like the plague.