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MOVIES
"The Orphanage"
***Australian release date: 29/5/2008***
The Orphanage, presented by Guillermo del Toro, is now playing in New York, Los Angeles, and other select cities!
A woman discovers dark secrets hidden within her cherished childhood home in the supernatural drama The Orphanage, the feature film debut of acclaimed young Spanish director Juan Antonio Bayona. A superbly atmospheric and emotionally powerful tale of love, loss, and guilt, The Orphanage is the first film ever to be presented by Guillermo del Toro.
Bayona and gifted first-time screenwriter Sergio Sanchez deliver an elegant, shivery ghost story in the tradition of such classics as The Innocents, The Haunting and The Others, as they explore the shadowy places where human longing meets the unknown and unknowable.
When was the last time you sat for a film and as you watched with wide eyes, an uneasy feeling fell over you? A tight little knot forms in your stomach. A wave of anxiety triggers goosebumps as a disconcerting quiet envelops the theater. If you are a die hard horror fan, I’m sure it’s been a long time since a film truly got under your skin. Welcome to The Orphanage, a film you’ll not soon forget. Director Guillermo del Toro has been single-handedly building the sub-genre we’ll call “Mexican Supernatural Thriller” with titles like The Devil’s Backbone and Pan’s Labyrinth. His stories emphasize content over spectacle, raising the drama of each moment to the foreground, but wrapping it tightly in otherworldly ether resulting in a tale that often chills the watcher to their core. The Orphanage has a very similar feel and oddly, it is not a del Toro film! Apparently the del Toro name is becoming somewhat of a marquee draw like “Quentin Tarantino presents”, and in this case, I’m hoping the name helps to push this amazing film into as many theaters as possible. Let’s get to the meat of it.
A mysterious old woman is found on the property and an impending dread follows. Simon’s playmates jump in number and his behavior becomes erratic. During a party, Simone vanishes. Now Laura must find out why her son is gone, and whom or what has taken him. Finding the answers will unravel a mystery thought dead and buried for many years … but as we know from experience, in these creepy little tales, things tend to not stay buried. Rueda plays Laura as a loving mother and free spirit, not against chasing after her son whose imagination drives them on. There is vulnerability amid her fearlessness though which comes across in moments of terror. She feels the darkness coming, and you feel it along with her. Princep is every bit the angelic little boy needed for this role with no forcing of cuteness you might find in an American film, all too often. His sleepy little voice is just the thing to lull you into a false sense of security … the ultimate set up! Beware the anime eyed little boys!!
Also of note is a cameo from Geraldine Chaplin as Aurora the spirit sensitive who comes to investigate the house. Her performance will remind you of a similar scene from Poltergeist, only Aurora seems way more at risk of attack by whatever inhabits the house. I think I held my breathe through the entire scene.
Bayona conditions his audience to dread such moments and feel them coming, as evidenced by one such movie-goer in my screening whom, upon realizing the music had stopped and all noise had ceased, let out a groan of discomfort, knowing full well she was about to jump out of her seat. I offer further proof with a one Miss Heather Buckly, my date for the evening, who is an encyclopedia of horror films and the last person you would expect to be shaken by a ghost story. Standing on the street in the middle of Times Square, NYC, Heather remarked “I’m still seriously freaked out!” I have no doubt The Orphanage will stand as one of the most chilling movies ever created. Be prepared for appalling images, jump scares by the dozen, slow building creeps and a finale so heartbreaking you’ll be speechless. Do not miss this film. Synopsis Pan's Labyrinth director Guillermo Del Toro produces director Juan Antonio Bayona's gothic frightener about a long-abandoned orphanage with a particularly troubling past. As a child, young orphan Laura spent her formative years being cared for by the staff of a large orphanage located by the Spanish seaside. Those were some of the happiest years of Laura's life, and now, thirty-years later, the former charge returns to the dilapidated institution with her husband Carlos and their seven-year old son Simon to re-open the orphanage as a facility for disabled children. But something ominous haunts the darkened hallways of this silent, stately manor. When Simon's behavior begins to grow increasingly bizarre and malicious, Laura and Carlos start to suspect that the mysterious surroundings have awoken something ominous in the young boy's imagination. It's not long before Laura, too, is drawn into this disturbing web and the repressed memories of the past come flooding back in a terrifying torrent of tension and deeply disturbing revelations. With opening day drawing near and their situation growing increasingly grim by the day, Simon attempts to write off their son's bizarre behavior as a desperate bid to get more attention from his distracted parents. Laura isn't so easily convinced of this theory though, and soon embarks on a desperate quest to unearth the terrible secret that lurks in the old house waiting for just the right moment to inflict devastating damage on both her and her family. Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide
Trailer: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0464141/trailers-me60965548
Attended the first commercial screening of The Orphanage (El Orfanato) last night at FrightFest, London. Juan Antonio Bayona and writer Sergio G. Sanchez have delivered something really special for their first feature. I have never jumped out of my seat like I did last night, nor my partner, nor most of the audience it seemed. Apart from the terrific scares, there are solid performances from the whole cast, stunning cinematography, and the editing is flawless. If I had to criticise one element, it is that the music swells just a little too much a couple of times, but it is a good score nonetheless. See this one at the cinema.
Michael Caine Conjures Up A Role in ‘Is There Anybody There?’
Plot summary for - Is There Anybody There? (2008) "Set in 1980s seaside England, this is the story of Edward, an unusual ten year old boy growing up in an old people's home run by his parents. Whilst his mother struggles to keep the family business afloat, and his father copes with the onset of mid-life crisis, Edward is busy tape-recording the elderly residents to try and discover what happens when they die. Increasingly obsessed with ghosts and the afterlife, Edward's is a rather lonely existence until he meets Clarence, the latest recruit to the home, a retired magician with a liberating streak of anarchy. Is There Anybody There? tells the surprising, touching story of this odd couple - a boy and an old man - facing life together, with Edward learning to live in the moment and Clarence coming to terms with the past."
Not so long ago, he played a magician’s helper in “The Prestige,” so why not take a turn as a magic man himself? That’s just what Michael Caine is going to do in his next film, the previously unannounced “Is There Anybody There?” Directed by acclaimed Irish director John Crowley (”Intermission”), the film is, in the words of Caine, “about a little boy of ten who lives in an old people’s home owned by his mother and father. And he keeps making friends and of course every time he makes a friend, the people die. So he gets a camera and a tape recorder looking for their ghosts.” Hmm, so it’s a little “Ghostbusters” and a little, um…”The Sixth Sense”? “Batteries Not Included”? I don’t know. Caine says he plays an old magician who comes to the home to die “and he helps [the boy] find these ghosts. It’s very funny. Very touching.” Due for Release Late 2008
The Invisible
Rating (MA vla)
This is an impressive, multi-layered and suspenseful fantasy drama and first feature film from Joel Bergvall and Simon Sandquist. Niklas is an intelligent young man who lives with his possessive, widowed mother. He is made a scapegoat by a gang of thieves, after the police are tipped off about their robbery. Kidnapped and badly beaten Niklas is then abandoned in the woods, believed dead. After the incident Niklas continues on with life as usual, until he realises that nobody can see or hear him as he hovers somewhere between life and death in an invisible state. "Well worth a look - and I believe much better than the Hollywood 2007"
http://www.41themovie.com/
01:00 AM EDT on Friday, October 26, 2007
Old images of the personable Nicky O’Neill make it clear why he touched so many lives. The oddly titled 41, a documentary feature about Nicholas O’Neill, the youngest victim of the Station nightclub fire in 2003, is really two movies of two very different calibers. Much of the first half of the nearly two-hour film is taken up with introducing us to Nicky and seems to be a heartfelt memorial to him that would appeal mostly to family and friends. There are lots of home video shots of Nicky, from babyhood to shortly before the night he died in the fire that erupted at the Station in West Warwick during a concert by the Great White. He was there because his band, Shryne, had been booked to open for Great White the next night. It was going to be Nicky’s big professional break. The early home video footage includes shots of Nicky playing at home, being very precocious, exhibiting his love for musical theater. There are several clips from juvenile stage productions he took part in, as well as recently recorded interviews with his mother, his girlfriend, his brothers and his friends. Every one of them seems to have been bowled over by Nicky’s charm and talent. There’s no denying that in these old images, he comes across as very personable and with a lot of charisma. A natural performer, it is clear why he touched so many lives, although there are hints of a troubling dark cloud that hovered over him as a young teen. It’s all sort of insular, and for a long time, 41, which was Nicky’s favorite number and which figures prominently in the film’s second half, seems very much a family affair. Indeed, Christian O’Neill, Nicky’s older half brother, co-directed the film with Christian de Rezendes, who hadn’t known the family previously. So at first, 41 seems about as interesting as looking at some stranger’s home movies, albeit with a tragic footnote that we know is waiting in the wings. To make it even more personal, near the start of his film, de Rezendes even recounts the details of what led him to make 41. Nevertheless, halfway through, just after the fire that took 100 lives on the night of Feb. 20, 2003, 41 becomes something much more than a fond reminiscence made with cute home movies. It takes on an eerie quality as it explores odd coincidences that have been noticed following his death, ponders Nicky’s writings that seem to contain a premonition of his death, and draws in mediums in hopes of bridging the line between life and death. There are strange occurrences, too: a wind-up carousel horse knickknack that begins playing on its own; a phone call from Nicky’s cell phone that comes shortly before his body is found in the rubble of the Station; a mysterious voice that turns up on a recording while a medium is interviewing his parents. Creepily, we also glimpse Nicky himself very briefly, standing very close to the stage at the Station, just as the deadly pyrotechnics begin flaring. And there’s the reoccurrence of the number 41 that keeps appearing to Nicky’s friends and relatives, sometimes in the strangest places. The number is even glimpsed in one of the earliest video recordings of Nicky himself. Weird coincidences, or is there something more? As it reaches out to the Other Side and tries to make a connection between the living and the dead, 41 mesmerizes with its Touched By an Angel qualities. This is more than just a film for the family and friends of Nicky O’Neill. Its world premiere screening will be Sunday afternoon at the Stadium Theater in Woonsocket, just a few days before Halloween. And that seems just perfect. *** Starring: Nicholas O’Neill, Christian O’Neill, Dave Kane. Rated: Not rated, contains adult themes. |
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