Entertainment Within Despair

One might wonder how we can narrow down the greatest horror films to a select few when the selection is so vast. How to we narrow this number down to a top five, a top ten, or even a top twenty when there are so many great horror films out there to choose from? This isn’t something that’s easy to do, in my opinion it’s next to impossible, but many have done it. I am going to attempt to do it here myself. I can’t narrow down the best of the best. What I can do is name three films have an equal amount of respect and appreciation for. I won’t be naming one over the other, or say one is lower than another, rather I’ll just talk about their strengths, their themes, and just talk about why these movies need to be seen especially around Halloween.

The Babadook:

The Babadook is a 2014 Australian psychological horror film written and directed by Jennifer Kent, starring Essie Davis and Noah Wiseman, telling the story of a single widowed single mother, who has a very difficult son, with a fear of monster. When a mysterious pop up story book shows up on his shelf one night; a book telling the story of The Babadook, an entity that will get you if you let it in; and this sets off the events of the film like the shot of a bullet.

I remember when this film came out, there was a lot of talk about the film do to its trailer on Youtube. I didn’t actually see the trailer, but saw one review done by film critic Chris Stuckmann and this was a movie that was right up my alley, and sure enough it was. It takes a lot for a horror film to really get under my skin, especially when you see the characters more than you see the creature that’s seen as the threat. That’s what makes this film so powerful to me. The memorable characters, the history of every character and how it’s explored, and just how beautifully disturbing it explores the emotions of grief and depression into a way that makes this film completely original. The other piece of the film that can’t go unnoticed are the performances from the central characters. Essie Davis as the mother gives a chilling Oscar worthy performance as this mother who is desperate to hold everything together, while also crumbling from her own inner demons. Noah Wiseman as the little boy is also very strong, especially when you consider how young this boy was at the time this film was made. When you need to feel annoyed with his character, you feel annoyed with his character, when you feel scared for him, you feel scared for him. Every mark this young man has to hit, he hits them.

This is a smart film, one that never cheats, and never treats its audience like their stupid, but gives them something challenging that actually forces them to think when they wake out of the film. This movie is much more than a creature feature; it’s something much deeper that delves into grief and depression brought on by grief, and needs to be seen to believe.

The Witch:

The Witch is a 2015 period piece written and directed by Robert Eggers, about a family in 1500s New England who are cast out of their initial group of settlers and find their own pocket of land to live. Shortly after their arrival, the family experiences a horrible tragedy that would break any family even in the best of circumstances. On top of all of this, it’s realized quickly there just might be something supernatural going on in the woods beyond them.

This film is really one of a kind. For one, the way which every person in this film speaks is straight from that period of time, very much giving a sound similar to that of Shakespeare, making all the more important to pay attention to everything that’s going on in this film.

The Witch is a slow burn of a film that takes its time to build to the intense disturbing moments. Some might not care for this time of film experience, but for me personally, it was like watching a train slowly starting to move its wheels. You know it’s going to start moving, you know it’s all going to lead to something insane, yet you have to sit and just take in the whole experience until it’s moving full speed down the track and you feel yourself experiencing extreme emotional whiplash from the whole cinematic experience.

What really makes this movie something really different from the clichéd horror films of today with false jump scares and characters with little to know development is how much you believe and get sucked into the world that this film puts in front of you. The more you watch, the more you start to feel the intensity of these characters turning on each other, when they started as a strong family. Of course no one would have been able to see these intense emotions on the screen if not for the performances from the entire cast. Anya Taylor-Joy knocks this role out of the park with this role. She’s likeable, at times funny, and at other times very unnerving. My other favorite from the film are the parents played by Ralph Ineson and Kate Dickie, who play the anguish these parents feel when this unseen entity comes into their world. Together they give the feeling of wanting to protect their family, while also being at odds with this ungodly figure, when religion is more or less the foundation of their lives. Every performance shines in this film, but for me personally, those are the three that stick out to me off the top of my.

The other thing I love about this film is how much it reminds me of stories like “The Crucible” or even “The Lord of the Flies”, where over time you see that evil in some ways takes many forms. This is definitely a film to watch during Halloween, if you can handle this kind of film. I know for me personally, as much as I love this film, I’ve only seen it three times since its release, one of those three being to have a refreshed view of the film before writing this. Being someone who loves to watch and dissect films over and over again, that’s saying something.

Hereditary:

This move got robbed of every Oscar nominations in every category in my personal opinion. Now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk about the movie.

Hereditary is a 2018 horror film, written and directed by Ari Aster, about a family who has just laid the matriarch of their family to rest, only to have things go horribly wrong very quickly, turning from what you think will be a typical horror film, ends up becoming much deeper and much more disturbing.

I will never forget my first time seeing this film. I was living in the Berkeley area of California. This film was playing in only a few select theatres near me, and the best I could get was a 10pm show after my shift as a grocery store cashier ended at 9pm. Once I arrived by Lift, I bought my ticket and took my seat in a theatre which aside from me and perhaps four other people was completely empty. Once I walked out of that film, I in a way walked out a changed person. This was a film that was on another level of discomfort, almost like you’ve walked into a room and seen something you know you weren’t supposed to but know you will never be able to get it out of your head. Most of this is achieved through the powerful cast chosen for this film. Toni Collette gives without question the best performance of that year, if not her entire career. So many scenes with her in them, I felt completely gutted in the best kind of way, which is a hard thing as an actor to achieve without starting to look campy or cheesy. She comes off as completely authentic and heart breaking throughout the film. Other amazing performances include the actors playing Toni Collette’s children, Milly Shapiro as Charlie and Alex Wolff as Peter. Both of these young actors give performances most don’t give until they are well into their thirties. Milly Shapiro’s performance in many ways sets the tone for the film and does so beautifully, the performance meant to sustain that tone is Alex Wolff’s, who in my opinion next to Toni Collette gives the best performance of the film with how much his character his character is put through, and how much of the performance is given through Alex Wolff’s face, without saying a single word.

There’s so much more I could say about this film, from the cinematography, the editing, to the music, but for those not as well versed in the technical arts of film making, the things I mentioned in the previous paragraph will certainly be enough to satisfy you as far as a movie going experience.

Final Thoughts:

Grief explored in film isn’t something that’s new. There have been many, many different films that deal with the subject of grief. Why would this be? Well, when you think about it it’s the one emotion every single life form can relate to and understand, and every person has no doubt experienced these emotions more than once throughout their lifetime. This being sense it only makes sense that death and how we deal with death becomes a theme that’s constantly seen in films. What makes these films special? For me at least, they prove how a good psychological horror film can be the most a cathartic medicine of all. While much of what happens in all three of the films I mentioned are insane, they are in families we can understand, with feelings we all can understand. While these films might not straight up tell what it is they’re trying to say, an audience member who’s maybe recently gone through a death in the family, watch one of these films, and then feel free to let out any pent up emotions they’ve been holding in. That’s why in my personal opinion, we need films like these three films, and we need to support films like these.