Slow West

The House of the Devil (Ti West, 2009)

Nostalgia is usually a wistful affection for the past. In the case of the film industry, it's a lucrative hustle. A safe bet averting the risk of an original offering failing. Hence, successes from yesteryear are turned into sequels, prequels, remakes, reboots, interquels and whatever new spin can be hustled up in order to milk that cow. Thankfully, writer and director Ti West has always had a better grasp of what nostalgia entails than the vast majority of hacks lazily associating '80s aesthetics with grainy video filters, neon lighting and a synthwave soundtrack. In more recent years, his X trilogy (2022 - 2024) would mark his return to retro-style horror. However, the best example of West's masterful execution in this style is unquestionably his seminal retro horror The House of the Devil (2009); a remarkable shot on 16mm love letter to independent horror films of the '70s and early '80s.

Produced with a modest budget of just under $1M, The House of the Devil is a baby sitter in peril chiller set during the era of the Satanic Panic hysteria on the night of a lunar eclipse. The film's protagonist, Samantha "Sam" Hughes (Jocelin Donahue), is a college student who, desperate to earn cash and be an independent spirit, avoids a series of obvious red flags after seeing an advertisement for a baby sitter. The money on offer is too good to pass up, or so it seems. Thus, West's slow burn horror adds layer upon layer of elements that Sam can no longer avoid.

Of course, a young baby-sitter having to fend for her life in a horror film is hardly unique, but The House of the Devil does have the advantage of featuring one of the most realistic protagonists in this style of film. What makes Sam so special is the very fact she is both a down to earth and sympathetic character. Traits that have becomes increasingly rare in horror films since the 2010s. If anything, our protagonist is in the very same mould as Laurie Strode from John Carpenter's Halloween (1978). The girl-next-door.

Sam wouldn't be so well realised on film if it wasn't for Jocelin Donahue's great acting. The feathered hair, flannel shirt and high waisted jeans might be throwbacks to vanilla, do-gooder final girls from yesteryear, but Donahue manages to portray her character with incredible depth in her nuanced performance; making her a compelling character on screen. Donahue is an integral element to the film feeling equally authentic to the vintage vibe of the film. Therefore, it's such a disappointment not seeing her perform in anything equally as substantial ever since the release of the film.

As for the supporting cast, this includes recognisable veterans from notable genre films of the past. Dee Wallace has a minor role at the start of the film as a sympathetic landlady. Tom Noonan and Mary Woronov have larger roles as the unabashedly creepy Ulmans; the couple eager to hire Sam to babysit "Mother" so they can go off to celebrate the all important lunar eclipse mentioned throughout the film. Additionally, A.J. Bowen's callous spontaneity is alarming playing their son Victor. The bearded actor, shares a shocking scene with Sam's bubbly best friend Megan (Greta Gerwig), who might have been modelled on Lynda Van Der Klok, that can't be forgotten anytime soon.

Like many films of the '80s, The House of the Devil features a short music montage. Apart from the novelty factor of seeing Sam with her walkman dance around the spooky Ulman house to The Fixx's One Thing Leads to Another, it acts as an important segue from the slow build up of terror of the first half to the all out panic-mode in the second half of the film. The song abruptly ends once Sam accidentally knocks over a vase and a revelation to the immediate danger she is in.

Considering The House of the Devil has layers of nuance and an intentional slow pace, particularly in the first half, it's a title often criticised for being too slow by the Ritalin generation. Therefore, it's essentially a Marmite movie; you either love it, or hate it. Your host is one of those who absolutely adore it.

The ‘00s was a decade dominated by remakes. Remakes of classics from yesteryear and English language versions of foreign films for an audience too lazy and ignorant to read subtitles. Torture porn would boom in popularity and outshine the previous decades' worth of comparatively tame splatter movies. Yet, throughout this cinematic meat grind, The House of the Devil went back to the essence; when fear and suspense were just as integral to a bloody payoff.  By going against the grain, Ti West managed to succeed where so many other film makers have failed and truly recaptured on film a bygone era.

Classic. 

Scenes from a Marriage

It's been another incredible year thus far for Blu-ray and 4K UHD releases. For your humble host, notable releases include Grindhouse Releasing's completely stacked Lucio Fulci masterpiece The Beyond (1981), Arrow films' highly desired Sergio Leone Dollars Trilogy (1966 - 1968), and Hammer entering the boutique foray with Brian Clemens's Captain Kronos: Vampire Hunter (1974) (given the relaunched company's Doctor Jekyll (2023) flopped hard in cinemas, I don't really blame them). But the icing on the proverbial cake, for many, might very well be Second Sight's forthcoming release of Andrzej Żuławski's art-house horror Possession (1981) being released this December. The UK home distribution company initially announced the film's release over two years ago. Therefore, it's become a hotly anticipated title amongst cinephiles, collectors and greedy scalpers eager to flip it.

Truth be told, Possession is a film too surreal and ambiguous to completely define by even the brainiest film analysts. However, a short and general description would suggest it being about the psychological turmoil of a marriage falling apart; becoming horror manifest with some disturbing scenes. Thematically similar to David Cronenberg's The Brood (1979); which itself, served as an allegory to the bitter breakup the Canadian auteur had recently undergone. Żuławski had the benefit of shooting in the fractured city of Cold War era Berlin, adding to the film's central theme and creating a cold and captivating back drop in the process. The Polish director also managed to amass two career defining performances out of his two leads, Sam Neill and Isabelle Adjani. The experience left them both emotionally wrecked, and in the case of Adjani, she was left feeling suicidal.

Possession is often listed as one of the greatest films of all time amongst film critics, cinephiles and turd wave feminists. Call me a philistine, but despite its quality, it wouldn't get a spot in my ten favourite horror films released that very same year:

An American Werewolf in London (John Landis)

The Beyond (Lucio Fulci)

The Burning (Tony Maylam)  

Dark Night of the Scarecrow (Frank De Felitta)

Dead and Buried (Gary Sherman)

The Evil Dead (Sam Raimi)

Friday 13th Part 2 (Steve Miner) 

The Howling (Joe Dante)

The Prowler (Joseph Zito)

Scanners (David Cronenberg)

Fidel Gastro

The Platform (Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia, 2019)

Occasionally, a film which has been on my radar winds up disappearing like Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. Netflix's The Platform (2019), or, if we want to call it by its original Spanish title, El hoyo is one such film. Helmed by a first time director Galder Gaztelu-Urrutia, The Plaform piqued my interest largely due to it being a dystopian sci-fi thriller where residents of the Vertical Self-Management Centre, a vast prison tower nicknamed The Pit, serve a given period in order to achieve their freedom and improved status in the outside world. The inmates are allowed one object while confined in The Pit, which can be anything from a weapon to a violin. Each day, these individuals are fed via a magically descending concrete platform laden with food. The catch being, it's the only meal of the day and those on the highest levels can gorge on as much food as they want once the descending platform spends a short limited time on their level. Thus, the higher-ups can feast like kings, while the lesser fortunate, further down, might face the very real possibility of starving to death. Hence, The Platform is an exploration of classicism, greed and the true test of human solidarity. A further twist to this situation is the inmates being reassigned to a random level at the start of each month. 

Frank Zappa lookalike Goreng (Iván Massagué) is the latest inmate. Armed with a copy of Cervantes's novel Don Quixote, it's not long before he's forced to learn the basic rule of survival inside the megastructure: Eat to survive! Goreng's cellmate, Trimigasi (Zorion Eguileor), a short and stocky elderly man with a misanthropic outlook on life, is wondering how long his new cellmate will last.Trimigasi is also pleased that he's on Level 48 in the complex; a relatively high level where food is more likely to be available from the upper level. More chance of leftovers. The disparity between the two individuals could never be more different; including the reasons for their admittance in The Pit. Goreng volunteered to be in their for an accredited diploma, while it was either a one year stint in the hell hole or forever in a psychiatric hospital for throwing a TV out of his window and accidentally murdering someone.

Goreng comes with the solution that it would be fairer to ration the food. An amused Trimigasi asks him, if he's a communist. Goreng attempts to persuade the higher ups, unsurprisingly, he's ridiculed. Similarly, his plea is also rejected by those below him. It's not helped when the odious Trimigasi urinates on the lower level after they complain about no wine being left, either. The elderly cellmate's logic being they would have done the same, if the tables were turned.

Trimigasi: The people below us are below us.

Goreng: Next month they might be above us. 

Trimigasi: Yes, and they'll piss on us. The bastards.

Goreng also has his first encounter with the beautiful Miharu (Alexandra Masangkay), a mute and battle-scarred woman, who rides the platform in the desperate hope of finding her child in the lower depths of the pit. Goreng is shocked by the notion of a child even being in the concrete hellhole. And yet, as Goreng's first month rolls by, he adapts to his environment; becoming more comfortable with eating from the platform and forming a close bond with Trimigasi. The scenes where he reads to his elderly cellmate and they exercise together for their mental and physical healths, are genuinely endearing.

Our cellmates' relationship takes a dramatic turn once the sleeping gas wears off and Goreng wakes up tied and gagged to his bed by Trimigasi. It's the start of a new month, and the pair are now way down the hole on Level 171. Starvation is very real. Trimigasi has been in this position before and survived it by resorting to cannibalism. The elderly man proposes a dark and twisted offer to his cellmate: he'll carve strips of Goreng's flesh to feed the both of them. In the midsts of his leg being cut up by the old cannibal, he's saved by Miharu and Trimigasi is subsequently killed by Goreng. Thus, the wannabe revolutionary himself turns to cannibalism in order to the rest of the month in the Pit. Having eaten human flesh, the act has made Goreng see visions of Trimigasi; haunting him from beyond the grave.

Another month, another twist of fate. Goreng is now on Level 33, a far more survivable part of the Pit. He's greeted by Ramses II, a sausage dog owned by a woman named Imoguiri (Antonia San Juan), the very same admittance officer who interviewed him for his application for the Vertical Self-Management Centre. Having lost her fight with cancer, the new inmate has decided to spend her final weeks learning of what her work has led to. She quickly learns how naïve she has been and makes similar pleas for solidarity and rationing to the other levels, echoing Goreng's first month. But it hits much harder for Imoguiri being a former employee for this diabolical construction. She has blood on her hands. How many have died here? Could her employers really have put a child in this ungodly construct? When the month passes, Goreng discovers he's on Level 202. Imoguiri has taken her own life. Once again, Goreng must eat human flesh. Another vision forever accompanying our protagonist. Imoguiri and Trimigasi now serving as our protagonist's good versus bad conscience.

Ascending to a more privileged Level 6 the following month, Goreng has a plan. Estimating there must be around 250 levels, our protagonist persuades his latest cellmate, Baharat (Emilio Buale), a religious man who literally gets shitted on by the higher-ups during an escape attempt, to descend to the lower levels with him in order to feed the prisoners below. They will demand the inmates on the first fifty levels to go without food for the day and use physical force if necessary to enforce it. During their decent, they encounter a scholar who suggests a message must also be sent to the hand that feeds them on Level 0; an untouched dish. The panna cotta is the message. 

The slow descent to the lower levels is easily the piece de resistance of The Platform. Gaztelu-Urrutia takes obvious inspiration from Dante's Inferno. The two cellmates traversing down on the magical concrete slab makes for compelling viewing. You're never sure what they expect. On one level you see charred remains of two people, on another two cellmates in a rubber pool, who turn out to be the film's story writers. A further twist is the platform going even further down than Goreng's estimation. It turns out out to be 333 levels. Two cellmates on each level. It couldn't be more clear what the Pit represents.

Gaztelu-Urrutia's commentary on capitalism and classism is about as subtle as being punched in the face by Frank Castle. Hardly, the first film with these criticisms, let alone the only that year. Bong Joon Ho's critically acclaimed Parasite (2019) was also released at the time. However, the South Korean black comedy, is a far more stylish and nuanced offering, whereas The Platform is ugly and austere. Incidentally, The Platform has more in common with Bong Joon Ho's dystopian sci-fi thriller Snowpiercer (2013), but the advantage of Tilda Swinton and Chris Evans not being in it. Another obvious influence is Vincenzo Natali's proto-Saw film Cube (1997) in its concept. Each of  The Platform's characters seem to represent archetypes in the dog eat dog world of the capitalist hierarchy: Trimigasi completely capable of committing evil to get to the top, while Imoguiri being blissfully unaware of her part in the brutal system she's contributed to until it's too late. Lastly, Goreng representing the socialist revolutionary striving for solidarity resorting to violence to enforce it after all pleasantries fail. The viewer never gets to see who runs the show, only a grim looking maître d' and cooks meticulously preparing the banquet of incredible food which is never enough to feed everyone.

The only real gripe is the ambiguous ending that I won't spoil. Considering how openly blunt the film's messaging has been, why opt for a cop out ending that's so intentionally vague? A notable sore point observed from other reviewers. Regardless, this wasn't enough to ruin my overall impression of the film. The many positives outweighed those final moments.

The Platform is a horrifying film; brutal, nihilistic and hard to recommend to any dog lovers. However, it's the film's sci-fi concept which is the most extreme aspect. The brutalist construct boxing everyone into various levels as an allegory to the class system. I absolutely loved this film so much, I immediately hunted checked out Gaztelu-Urrutia's two other subsequent efforts. Alas, both The Platform 2 (2024) and Rich Flu (2024 /25) are significant downgrades and even more infested with shameless Marxist propaganda than your kid's university. The latter film being utterly soporific despite a ridiculous premise of a virus which only targets the wealthy. In any case, at least comrade Gaztelu-Urrutia has one truly great film under his belt, making it a crying shame it's rotting on Netflix and not available on any English friendly physical format release.