RABID (2019)

 

(Director /co-screenwriters: Jen and Sylvia Soska, a.k.a. The Soska Sisters. Co-screenwriter: John Serge.)

 

Review

The Soska Sisters’ RABID, shot in nineteen days, is a remake of David Cronenberg’s 1977 film of the same name. Both movies share the same set-up and title. Aside from that, this updated feminist version on a synthetic plague is Soska-centric.

RABID 2019 takes place in a modern-day fashion house, where Rose Miller (Laura Vandervoort, JIGSAW, 2017) is a shy dressmaker, aspiring to design her own dresses. Most, including her arrogant boss (Günter), consider her beneath their notice, and she internalizes that lie. A motorcycle accident nearly kills her, necessitating wildly experimental surgery to keep her alive. The site of her lifesaving, later cosmetic, surgeries: Burroughs Clinic, named for her surgeon, Dr. William Burroughs. (The Soskas’ use of Burroughs is a nod to Cronenberg, specifically his 1991 film NAKED LUNCH, based on William S. Burroughs’s 1959 novel of the same name.)

Rose comes out of her surgeries and follow-up therapy more beautiful and self-assured. Everyone around her is wowed not only by her improved appearance and outgoing personality, but the bold new dress designs Günter employs her to create. Privately, though, she is in turmoil. She has not fully wrapped her head around her recent sea-changes. It does not help that the red “special diet” smoothies Burroughs tells her to drink make her stomach cramp─even as she is unable to process regular food, aside from raw meat. Also, her dreams are horrific, splateriffic scenarios, situations where she is a flesh-tearing aggressor. Unbeknownst to her, she is Patient Zero in a savage epidemic.

The climactic scenes where Rose comes into her gory glory is holy-frak crazy, making the penile-worm-in-her-armpit look tame. This chaos erupts at Häus Günter’s splashy fashion show, revealing Rose’s like-nothing-seen-before dress designs. In the end, it’s up to each viewer to decide if Rose’s fate is kinder or crueler than that of her 1977 counterpart’s (Marilyn Chambers played Rose in the original film). It’s certainly different.

One way the Soskas set their RABID apart from Cronenberg’s is the cinematography (courtesy of Kim Derko, LAND OF THE DEAD, 2005). The Soskas’ film is glossy, with lots of theme-consistent, bright red on display─like the dresses the filmmaking siblings wear in their cameos, as cocaine-snorting, gossipy fashion snobs. The look of Cronenberg’s RABID is dark, wintry, and sludgy.

The Soskas, Serge and editor Erin Deck also created a tighter, more intuitive, and less character-raw film.  It flows better than Cronenberg’s version. The acting level is about the same, with campiness underscoring some of the characters’ interactions in the Soska version. Not only that, the Soskas have graced her with a last name and a job/career, something Cronenberg’s version did not mention or show onscreen.

Sharp-eyed Cronenberg fans may appreciate the scene where Burroughs and Dr. Keloid operate on Rose (Keloid is a character from the 1977 film; he is now played by an unsettling Stephen McHattie). During the surgery, Keloid and Burroughs wear wine-red surgeon’s gowns, a nod at Cronenberg’s 1988 film DEAD RINGERS, where twin brothers─also surgeons─wear the same outfits.

Both versions of RABID might prove interesting and worthwhile, if you shed expectations prior to viewing them. They’re different beasts built in a similar structure.

SEE NO EVIL 2 (2014)

 

(Directors: Jen and Sylvia Soska. Screenwriters: Nathan Brookes and Bobby Lee Darby.)

Storyline

An uninvited Jacob Goodnight crashes an undertaker’s birthday celebration and does what does well: killing people.

Review

Religious fanatic and serial killer Jacob Goodnight returns in this disappointing sequel to the 2006 slasher SEE NO EVIL. The main problem with the film is its script, penned by Nathan Brookes and Bobby Lee Darby─not only does it resurrect, without explanation, Goodnight (whose death was explicitly shown onscreen in the first movie), but EVIL 2 quickly devolves into the usual, mostly uninspired hunt-and-slaughter situations of the genre. (A few of the kills are creative and visually interesting.) It does not help that the characters, as they’re written, don’t have much backstory or chemistry. Despite that, several of the actors in the film─Scream Queens Danielle Harris (HALLOWEEN 4 and 5, 1988 and 1989) and Katharine Isabelle (the GINGER SNAPS trilogy, 2000-2004) rise above the thin-even-for-horror characterizations and breathe as much life as they can into their roles, especially Isabelle, whose character (Tamara) is played with over-the-top zest. Glenn “Kane” Jacobs, once again, plays Goodnight as best he can. Unfortunately, anything fresh he brings to his character is hobbled by bad writing (though Goodnight speaks whole sentences now).

A plus-element in EVIL 2 is Jen and Sylvia Soska, a.k.a. the Soska Sisters, who do what they can to salvage this lackluster follow-up. It’s well-shot and they inject some visual humor here and there─e.g., in the opening credits, when their directorial billing is shown, the sisters are onscreen as two corpses on metal rolling carts.  I liked how Goodnight is dispatched (again) into the netherworld near the end, but the final shots─which should’ve come earlier in the film, answering any questions about his not being dead─are belatedly inserted, coming off as cheap-cheat finish.

You can skip EVIL 2, unless you’re a Soska Sisters/Harris/Isabelle/Kane completist.

SEE NO EVIL (2006)

 

(Director: Gregory Dark. Screenwriter: Dan Madigan.)

Storyline

In a falling-apart hotel, a psychopath (Jacob Goodnight) hunts a group of teenagers.

 

Review

EVIL is a solid slasher film. The acting, its setting, its pacing, and writing (for the most part) are entertaining in a smart-minded way. Jacob Goodnight is a chilling killer with a well-explained backstory─it helps that Glenn Jacobs, a.k.a. WWF/E wrestler Kane, plays him with brutal efficiency and surprising nuance when Goodnight’s emotional side comes to the fore (the guy’s got chops!). According to IMDb, the role was written specifically for the 6’7” wrestler, whose character’s name was not uttered in the film. The rest of the actors do their jobs well, and the stinking, corpse-strewn Blackwell Hotel (with its falling-apart secret passages and two-way mirrors) is a great, atmospheric terror site.

There are few surprises story-wise, instances of crude humor, and several scenes where characters─who have briefly knocked Goodnight out of action─fail to follow through in killing him because they flee or don’t help their friends when it matters most. This last flaw, a staple in the horror genre, is not egregious here like it is in other films because most of the other elements and execution of EVIL are top-notch. It’s not going to win anybody an Oscar, but in a genre littered with so many crappy flicks, a high-budget horror film that delivers continuous, smart-minded frights like this does stands out. If you’re a fan of crude humor, make sure to watch the end-credits. Followed by SEE NO EVIL 2 (2014, directed by Jen and Sylvia Soska, a.k.a. The Soska Sisters).

AMERICAN MARY (2012)

 

(Directors/screenwriters: Jen and Sylvia Soska, a.k.a. The Soska Sisters)

Storyline

An opportunity for easy money tempts a medical student, Mary, Mason, to enter the world of underground surgeries, one that alters her more than she expects.

Review

Jen and Sylvia Soska's (a.k.a.The Soska Sisters) first feature film is an above-average, often gory and mostly well-paced film about poverty, systemic sexism, rape, alienation, and one woman’s character-paced path to redemption. Katharine Isabelle (best known for the GINGER SNAPS trilogy) is excellent as Mary Mason, a desperate woman who learns to embrace her beyond-normal-bounds darkness while pursuing revenge and a reputation as a body modification surgeon with equal vigor. Isabelle’s top-notch acting is ably supported by other above-average actors as well, including Tristan Risk as Beatrice (a woman with strange “plastic” Barbie Doll features) and Antonio Cupo as Billy Barker, a strip club owner who’s falling in love with Mary, aiding her underground endeavors.

Those looking for a happy finish might be disappointed, but it keeps with the tone and arc of Mary’s bleakward spiral. AMERICAN, with its strong feminist theme and characters, is worth watching, an excellent first feature by the Soskas, who appear in the film as creepy twins who want surgery to bring them closer together.