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So, speaking of movie scores ...
The Reaping kinda sucked. The music worked way too hard, heavy, over dramatic in a way that when done right can be hugely affective, like in The Exorcist, but that here was just melodramatic and a little B movie of the week. Originally scored by Philip Glass who also scored The Hours and Kundun, The Reaping was re-scored by John Frizzell who composed the score for Office Space, Alien Resurrection and Thirteen Ghosts. No wonder it blowed. Suckage also turned out to be a theme because the entire movie was a failure at whatever it actually was attempting. The plot was convoluted, the dialogue was crappy, it wasn't scary and the only reason that I was grossed out was because I made the mistake of eating a grilled cheese sandwich right in the middle of the lake of blood scene. (I have a delicate stomach, yo!)
So, let's make a movie and let's set it in the creepy backwaters of the Louisiana Bayou. We'll fill it with happy, southern people dealing with creepy biblical plagues. Throw in a newly menstruating blonde baby girl with big creepy blue eyes and surely we'll have a hit. Was that the pitch meeting? Did anyone really buy that? Hilary Swank did and I hope that she didn't read the script before she signed on cause the only thing that did work was the aforementioned blonde, blue-eyed creepy girl.
The Reaping fails at what The Skeleton Key excelled at. You're filming in the south in the bayou only kinda not really. I never got that heavy, languid, creepily atmospheric feeling that pervaded the landscape in The Skeleton Key. The Reaping's version of the Louisiana Bayou was sanitized and too bright. Hilary Swank gently perspired, the plantation was being renovated, but maybe most of the work had already been done. There was no peeling paint or squeaky steps, no rotting wood, very little in the way of tangled underbrush. That heavy feeling you get in tropical locales was completely missing.
Having only ever been to Louisiana in the spring and summer maybe I'm missing something and they were filming in the winter.
There was the requisite church songs playing in the background on an old record player, mystical, dreamy maybe sex, suspect heroes and the looming apocalypse. With all of that you would think that this movie could work it out. It was spliced with dream sequences and jumbled flashbacks that collided and, I suppose, were meant to make a kind of sense and reveal all sorts of super secret information cause hey, jumbled flashbacky dream sequences, what about that doesn't scream CLUE. Unfortunately, the clues only confused us more and we actually paused, re-wound and slow-mo'd through a couple of them. It still didn't really make sense. Not that that was unusual because most of the movie didn't make sense either and we all sat back as the credits rolled to try and piece together what actually happened and how in the heck Hilary Swank ended up carrying the anti-Christ when the entire time we thought the big-eyed blonde girl was the perfect demon child.
Well, as it turns out the blonde, Lauren, was a sort of angel. A second born child embodying the wrath of God, Lauren's purpose is to destroy the evil that's been brewing in Haven, Louisiana for generations. I have to say that I called it as we watched Lauren and Katherine (Hilary Swank) bond over the joy of becoming a woman. I figured that the entire town had been worshipping Satan and that now that they'd "reaped" (see how they did that) the perfect child they were in a panic because they couldn't actually control her. Well, I was *almost* right. Turns out they were trying to kill her not because they couldn't control her but because she was going to Kill Them All. See, Little Lauren was conjuring the Ten Plagues of Egypt and if you all recall the tenth plague is the Death of the First Borns. Well, Haven just so happened to be a town full of first born's as part of the tenets of their devil worshipping sect.
The entire movie was difficult and mostly silly and I couldn't figure out why Hilary Swank ran around at night in a flowing white skirt. What was that about, really?! Then there was, of course, the one COC, Ben. Ben is Katherine's T.A. from LSU and he's got a Master's degree and he's an educated black man who believes in the Lord (been going to church every Sunday for ten years) and was saved back in the day when he used to be a drug dealer and gang banger and general all around bad man. Of course, he also died. Like I didn't see that one coming.
Dude, seriously?!
Yeah, that's what I said, too.
The only thing that I did like about the movie was AnnaSophia Robb as Lauren McConnell, the angel masquerading as the Anti-Christ. That little girl is beautiful and angelic and creepy all at the same time. With her big, big blue eyes and delicate bone structure she managed to be all of those things that I think Rob Zombie was looking for in Daeg Faerch and failed to find.
Idris Elba did a good job with the crappy dialogue and did a great job creating a generic American accent. Too bad, really, because I think all if not most of the characters were actually supposed to be from Louisiana. David Morrissey was especially bad. DUDE! Seriously creepy southern town in the creepy backwater bayous of Louisiana where "every bump in the night is the devil at your back door"! Seriously?!
I didn't see the point of paying Stephen Rea to appear in the movie and Hilary Swank took ten steps backwards to play the part. Blessedly it was only 96 minutes, although sadly, those 96 minutes happened to fall smack dab in the middle of Jeopardy.
The Reaping kinda sucked. The music worked way too hard, heavy, over dramatic in a way that when done right can be hugely affective, like in The Exorcist, but that here was just melodramatic and a little B movie of the week. Originally scored by Philip Glass who also scored The Hours and Kundun, The Reaping was re-scored by John Frizzell who composed the score for Office Space, Alien Resurrection and Thirteen Ghosts. No wonder it blowed. Suckage also turned out to be a theme because the entire movie was a failure at whatever it actually was attempting. The plot was convoluted, the dialogue was crappy, it wasn't scary and the only reason that I was grossed out was because I made the mistake of eating a grilled cheese sandwich right in the middle of the lake of blood scene. (I have a delicate stomach, yo!)
So, let's make a movie and let's set it in the creepy backwaters of the Louisiana Bayou. We'll fill it with happy, southern people dealing with creepy biblical plagues. Throw in a newly menstruating blonde baby girl with big creepy blue eyes and surely we'll have a hit. Was that the pitch meeting? Did anyone really buy that? Hilary Swank did and I hope that she didn't read the script before she signed on cause the only thing that did work was the aforementioned blonde, blue-eyed creepy girl.
The Reaping fails at what The Skeleton Key excelled at. You're filming in the south in the bayou only kinda not really. I never got that heavy, languid, creepily atmospheric feeling that pervaded the landscape in The Skeleton Key. The Reaping's version of the Louisiana Bayou was sanitized and too bright. Hilary Swank gently perspired, the plantation was being renovated, but maybe most of the work had already been done. There was no peeling paint or squeaky steps, no rotting wood, very little in the way of tangled underbrush. That heavy feeling you get in tropical locales was completely missing.
Having only ever been to Louisiana in the spring and summer maybe I'm missing something and they were filming in the winter.
There was the requisite church songs playing in the background on an old record player, mystical, dreamy maybe sex, suspect heroes and the looming apocalypse. With all of that you would think that this movie could work it out. It was spliced with dream sequences and jumbled flashbacks that collided and, I suppose, were meant to make a kind of sense and reveal all sorts of super secret information cause hey, jumbled flashbacky dream sequences, what about that doesn't scream CLUE. Unfortunately, the clues only confused us more and we actually paused, re-wound and slow-mo'd through a couple of them. It still didn't really make sense. Not that that was unusual because most of the movie didn't make sense either and we all sat back as the credits rolled to try and piece together what actually happened and how in the heck Hilary Swank ended up carrying the anti-Christ when the entire time we thought the big-eyed blonde girl was the perfect demon child.
Well, as it turns out the blonde, Lauren, was a sort of angel. A second born child embodying the wrath of God, Lauren's purpose is to destroy the evil that's been brewing in Haven, Louisiana for generations. I have to say that I called it as we watched Lauren and Katherine (Hilary Swank) bond over the joy of becoming a woman. I figured that the entire town had been worshipping Satan and that now that they'd "reaped" (see how they did that) the perfect child they were in a panic because they couldn't actually control her. Well, I was *almost* right. Turns out they were trying to kill her not because they couldn't control her but because she was going to Kill Them All. See, Little Lauren was conjuring the Ten Plagues of Egypt and if you all recall the tenth plague is the Death of the First Borns. Well, Haven just so happened to be a town full of first born's as part of the tenets of their devil worshipping sect.
The entire movie was difficult and mostly silly and I couldn't figure out why Hilary Swank ran around at night in a flowing white skirt. What was that about, really?! Then there was, of course, the one COC, Ben. Ben is Katherine's T.A. from LSU and he's got a Master's degree and he's an educated black man who believes in the Lord (been going to church every Sunday for ten years) and was saved back in the day when he used to be a drug dealer and gang banger and general all around bad man. Of course, he also died. Like I didn't see that one coming.
Dude, seriously?!
Yeah, that's what I said, too.
The only thing that I did like about the movie was AnnaSophia Robb as Lauren McConnell, the angel masquerading as the Anti-Christ. That little girl is beautiful and angelic and creepy all at the same time. With her big, big blue eyes and delicate bone structure she managed to be all of those things that I think Rob Zombie was looking for in Daeg Faerch and failed to find.
Idris Elba did a good job with the crappy dialogue and did a great job creating a generic American accent. Too bad, really, because I think all if not most of the characters were actually supposed to be from Louisiana. David Morrissey was especially bad. DUDE! Seriously creepy southern town in the creepy backwater bayous of Louisiana where "every bump in the night is the devil at your back door"! Seriously?!
I didn't see the point of paying Stephen Rea to appear in the movie and Hilary Swank took ten steps backwards to play the part. Blessedly it was only 96 minutes, although sadly, those 96 minutes happened to fall smack dab in the middle of Jeopardy.
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no subject
Date: 2008-03-06 07:02 am (UTC)From:I agree with you about the well-played creepiness of AnnaSophia Robb. If she acts this well as an adult, I shall look forward to her future career.
Other than that, the only thing about this movie I liked (and I only liked it because I'm a big softie, and because Hilary Swank actually sold the line, I thought) was the bit at the end between Hilary and AnnaSophia before the entire town died:
"How do I know? How do I know what's real?"
"Faith."
I admit it, I teared a little. Impressive, for a movie I found so mind-numbingly bad and generally dull, that there was even one second of emotional resonance.
no subject
Date: 2008-03-06 07:19 am (UTC)From:Finally, we decided it just wasn't any good, like, at all. Although, I did kinda like the reveal that the anti-Christ wasn't really the anti-Christ. Only it got kinda ruined and we really didn't believe that Lauren was a good guy even all the way up to the end when they were driving away. We kept waiting for her to turn and look all evil-eyed at the audience or for her to lose her mind right there in the middle of the road while they were driving. Or something ... the whole preganancy thing was kinda huh ... and then it was over and the pondering and debating began.
I, for one, am very glad that I only borrowed it from a friend because if I had bought it or rented it then I would have been really upset.