I still hold that his latest film The Ward (2010) is not a John Carpenter film; he is not involved in both the script-work and music, which in itself is pretty self-explanatory. I think it as an unthought-of plunge to quickie horror by a legendary director who has made terrific use of his time but has also been spent in the process. Succeeding his space-western Ghosts of Mars (2001) and two Masters of Horror episodes, The Ward, I hold, is simply Carpanter’s own reaffirmation that cinema is “actually fun again” (he told in an Observer [New York] interview).
That said, my respect for who I consider the most underrated filmmaker of our time does not thin one bit. Ahead are six films that share the same flame for Carpenter and hold the director’s works seminal, some of them even borrowing his signature Albertus typeface.
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Cold of July
US / Crime, Thriller / R
Dir. Jim Mickle / Scr. Mickle, Nick Damici
Cast. Michael C. Hall, Wyatt Russell, Vinessa Shaw
True to Carpenter’s legacy—basically redefining B-horror films—Jim Mickle has proven himself with disciplined B-genre works such as Stake Land and We Are Who We Are. Much is true about Cold in July, a film which I think is Mickle’s most vibrant work to date. The film, starring Michael C. Hall as a Texan storeowner, is best read a period piece, relying on intricate detailing to everything that appears on-screen including, even, microwave ovens. It’s no surprise that the film’s composer Jeff Grace had opted for a timely score that, in lesser hands, would have played as mere throwback.
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The Babadook
AU / Horror, Drama / R-13
Dir. Jennifer Kent / Scr. Jennifer Kent
Cast. Graham Skipper, Josh Ethier, Vanessa Leigh
The Babadook, one of the best films released this year, is a magnified look at the fears of parenthood and the daunting seemingly endless process of grief. The film finds a mother-and-son terrorized by a ghoulish character from a pop-up children’s book called Mr. Babadook; both mother and son played auspiciously by Essie Davis and Noah Wiseman. Once taking apprenticeship from auteur Lars Von Trier, director Jennifer Kent had made use of her film’s simplistic story to convey many degrees of horror in a conflicted mother-and-child relationship that is both tender and heart-breaking. The German Expressionist undertones is no coincidence, too, Kent taking notes from the silent films of Carl Theodore Dreyer; and the formal elegance to The Babadook she takes from studying John Carpenter, Dario Argento and Mario Brava. Check out my review here.
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Almost Human
US / Sci-Fi, Horror, Thriller / NR
Dir. Joe Begos / Scr. Joe Begos
Cast. Graham Skipper, Josh Ethier, Vanessa Leigh
Anyone who had seen Carpenter’s The Thing will note the easy semblance Almost Human studiously builds. Yet this does not end the 80’s throwback director Joe Begos has in mind: there are tinges of The Blob and The Hidden on top of being familiar in the language of visual space. The story is centred on the disappearance of a man and his reappearance as a completely different creature, tracing an old flame to hail an extra-terrestrial. Ti West’s The House of the Devil makes a way retrospective of the era, but it doesn’t take away the fact that Almost Human, as far as throwback pastiches go, is a fun and worthwhile try.
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Violator
PH / Horror, Thriller / R-13
Dir. Eduardo “Dodo” Dayao / Scr. Eduardo “Dodo” Dayao
Cast. Joel Lamangan, RK Bagatsing, Andy Bais
Violator very much recalls Kiyoshi Kurosawa with its apocalyptic undertones; a bit Ingmar Bergman with its notions of death and religion; and Carpenter in its unrelenting Assault in Precinct 13-like third arc. The score—also very Carpenter-like—is laced with eerie electronic music, taking notes from bands like, I had imagined Nine Inch Nails (but Dodo had cited The Cramps as a primary influence), and Kanye West’s “I Am A God,” going as far as almost using the track title for his film. I have seen Violator this past Cinema One Originals Festival and thought it “enunciates a history of learning and his passion for the craft.” Read my review here.
Sidenote: a terrific film to watch alongside Raya Martin’s How to Disappear Completely.
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The Guest
US / Horror, Thriller, Comedy / R-13
Dir. Adam Wingard / Scr. Simon Barrett
Cast. Dan Stevens, Sheila Kelley, Maika Monroe
Adam Wingard and Simon Barrett are the ones behind last year’s You’re Next, an obvious ode to old home invasion thrillers and a big-emotioned Dear John to the genre as a whole. Their latest collaboration comes in the form of The Guest, which is an inverted play at Carpenter’s Halloween. Where the masked madman is most sinister from afar, Wingard and Barrett’s tormentor (played by Dan Stevens) is masked behind a handsome face and suspicious properness. He’s your friend. Your ally. But he’s also a soldier who will see to the accomplishment of his tasks, no matter how fatal and savage his methods. The film’s score, heavily influenced by that of Halloween III: Season of the Witch, only begins the nods Wingard makes to filmmakers from the said era, all while building a compelling narrative that is enthralling yet sparse.
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Blue Ruin
US / Horror, Thriller, Drama / R
Dir. Jeremy Saulnier / Scr. Jeremy Saulnier
Cast. Macon Blair, Devin Ratray, Amy Hargreaves
Jeremy Saulnier’s contemplative, atmospheric piece of noir, set mostly in Virginian backwoods, holds a firm directness towards its violence, but also allows to be tenderly ruminative in centring his grubby, vagrant hero Dwight (a terrific, terrific Malcon Blair) between a decades’ long family feud. I’ll give you a hint: in the space of eighty-five minutes, such a side-lined character (that of Eve Plumb) enters the frame whole, even if it was the final moments of the film. Taking his primary influences from The Coen Brothers, Saulnier in his film Blue Ruin pronounces himself a brilliant visual storyteller, taking notes, from the better of Carpenter—his intelligent use of space, ominous score and overall visual and sonic concision.
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If you have additions to this list, head over the comments below.
