Room (15.)
Directed by Lenny Abrahamson.
Starring Brie Larson, Jacob Tremblay, Joan Allen, Tom McCamus, Sean Bridger and William H. Macy. 118 mins
The horror film is just about the only type of film in risk-averse Hollywood where it is still acceptable to not have a happy ending, though even these are getting rarer. The horror film happy ending usually involves the abused heroine, blood splattered and dirt smeared, chest heaving in tight top, standing over the dead (ah, but not really) body of her assailant. Room is a film about what happens after the horror film happy ending, how to cope with life after experiencing the worst it can throw at you.
In cinemas the torture porn fad seems to have passed. In sociopath circles there was a little movement for having a family locked-in-a-dungeon around the time of Joseph Fritzl, though the sociopath zeitgeist seems to have moved back to the hardy perennial spree kill. Based on the Emma Donaghue novel, Room imagines a woman (Larson) abducted when she was 17 and forced to live in a fortified garden shed by Old Nick (Bridger.) She shares the space with her 5 year old son (Tremblay) who knows nothing about the outside world other than what he sees on TV.
If the first half is torture porn it is Reader's Wives level torture porn. Room is a drably banal kind of hell and their captor Old Nick is a dull streak of bearded nothingness. Absolutely the best thing about Room is its total disinterest in its villain. He is shown when necessary and then discarded when not needed. The film is all about the victims. Midway through the film they escape and the second half, where they struggle to adapt back into happiness is what makes the film special.
Jack is really the film's central figure and to suggest Jack's alienation and incomprehension with the big wide world he has been thrown into, director Abrahamson shoots a lot of scenes out of focus to suggest the sense of it all being too much for him. (It is a technique often used to suggest being newly born.) Abrahamson though is not a man for the big gesture. His measured approach really pulls you into their predicament while mirroring the awkwardness of the family as they try to tread around their inability to truly process what has happened to their daughter or relate to this new grandson.
I had some misgiving initially, centred on what we really gained from this portrayal of evil but the film slowly disarms them. With its low key portrait of suburban mid west horror, it is the film The Lovely Bones should've been.
Room (15.)
Directed by Lenny Abrahamson.
Starring Brie Larson, Jacob Tremblay, Joan Allen, Tom McCamus, Sean Bridger and William H. Macy. 118 mins
The horror film is just about the only type of film in risk-averse Hollywood where it is still acceptable to not have a happy ending, though even these are getting rarer. The horror film happy ending usually involves the abused heroine, blood splattered and dirt smeared, chest heaving in tight top, standing over the dead (ah, but not really) body of her assailant. Room is a film about what happens after the horror film happy ending, how to cope with life after experiencing the worst it can throw at you.
In cinemas the torture porn fad seems to have passed. In sociopath circles there was a little movement for having a family locked-in-a-dungeon around the time of Joseph Fritzl, though the sociopath zeitgeist seems to have moved back to the hardy perennial spree kill. Based on the Emma Donaghue novel, Room imagines a woman (Larson) abducted when she was 17 and forced to live in a fortified garden shed by Old Nick (Bridger.) She shares the space with her 5 year old son (Tremblay) who knows nothing about the outside world other than what he sees on TV.
If the first half is torture porn it is Reader's Wives level torture porn. Room is a drably banal kind of hell and their captor Old Nick is a dull streak of bearded nothingness. Absolutely the best thing about Room is its total disinterest in its villain. He is shown when necessary and then discarded when not needed. The film is all about the victims. Midway through the film they escape and the second half, where they struggle to adapt back into happiness is what makes the film special.
Jack is really the film's central figure and to suggest Jack's alienation and incomprehension with the big wide world he has been thrown into, director Abrahamson shoots a lot of scenes out of focus to suggest the sense of it all being too much for him. (It is a technique often used to suggest being newly born.) Abrahamson though is not a man for the big gesture. His measured approach really pulls you into their predicament while mirroring the awkwardness of the family as they try to tread around their inability to truly process what has happened to their daughter or relate to this new grandson.
I had some misgiving initially, centred on what we really gained from this portrayal of evil but the film slowly disarms them. With its low key portrait of suburban mid west horror, it is the film The Lovely Bones should've been.
