What is this poster trying to say? Who is the audience? This poster looks like he's rather angrily singing some Bible verses, maybe against abortion? Is it a heavily accented Irish drama concerning birth control, Catholics, and Angelina Jolie?
Would you have guessed it's about a Jewish demon from Auschwitz trying to surreptitiously possess a young Jewish maiden in 2009? Well I certainly didn't.
Before we begin deconstructing this lovely little piece of cinematic cancer, I want to remind you of an age old adage about people—basically, there are two kinds; those who believe the cup is half empty, and those that believe it is half full. If you are the latter, then you would say that the new horror film, The Unborn, is perhaps the best Jewish Horror Movie of 2009. If you are the former, then maybe you’d say this film is an anti-Semitic Horror film (or, really, not worth anyone’s time and energy).
It’s odd, but this film fits into the strange phenomenon of Holocaust/WWII themed films that opened over the past several months: Good, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, Valkyrie, Defiance, The Reader, etc. Are any of these in German? No. I haven’t seen all of these (I just can’t bring myself to give Tom Cruise money at the box office) but I’m going to be a slippery slope (no pun intended) and say that they were all relatively better than The Unborn, which went wrong in so many ways, I have to devise a plan of attack.
The CAST: Let’s begin with the film’s pretty little lead, Odette Yustman, who bravely portrays a young teenager who is in danger of being possessed by, what is colloquially referred to, as a dybbuk (which is, roughly, a Jewish demon). Ms. Yustman was previously blasted across our cinema screens in last year’s Cloverfield, which I will admit is less irritating, but still a trial in logical patience. She was the young lady whom the hero had to trek across the city to rescue because he had seemingly shagged her months before, and thereby caused the death of all his vacuous disciples while en route. Ms. Yustman’s performance in this new schlock-fest is, for lack of a better word, garbage. It’s about on par with Jessica Alba’s turn in The Eye. (To tell the truth, most of Alba’s astute characterizations come across as though she really were blind). Sadly, Yustman has the most screen time, the worst dialogue and I really wanted to tell the demon to possess a less bland and boring Jewish girl.
Next, we have Jane Alexander. Yes, that’s the same Oscar nominated Jane from The Great White Hope (1970), All the President’s Men (1976), Kramer Vs. Kramer (1979), and Testament (1983). So what’s she doing here? Well, Jane was nice and creepy in her small role in The Ring (2002), but here, she comes across a little silly, what with her faux-German accent, clutching a pointy Jewish star in the nursing home and being saddled with explaining just what silly shenanigans are happening to the film’s heroine. She strangely resembles Anjelica Huston in her nursing home scenes from Choke (2008), but in that film, Huston also played herself in the twenty-year flashbacks. Hmmmm.
Next stop on the Pointless Express is the boyfriend, played Cam Gigandet, who had to have a few shirtless scenes in order to elevate the dullness of his presence. Mr. Gigandet was also in another of 2008’s worst films, Twilight.
The saddest travesty of The Unborn, cast-wise? GARY OLDMAN. What the hell, Gary? Couldn’t they have found a more believable Jewish rabbi? Was it the writer’s strike Gary? I mean, this is the man that was in The Professional (1994) and True Romance (1993). And all those god-help-me-isn’t-the-last-one-filmed-yet Harry Potter movies! I’m guessing that the director, who got screenwriter cred for The Dark Knight (2008), somehow manipulated or drugged Mr. Oldman into performing in this debauchery. Or like poor Gina Gershon in Showgirls (1995), maybe he just didn’t read the script. Either way, his faux-Jewish wig-hair-do and the exorcism scene made me wish this was straight to DVD for Gary’s sake. And almost not worthy of complaining about is Carla Gugino (Sin City – 2008; Spy Kids – 2001), who barely blips onto screen in flashbacks as Yustman’s mentally deranged mother who hanged herself. Maybe someone did read the script.
The PLOT: (SPOILER ALERT). Now I am sorry if I ruin the phantasmagorical anti-climactic elements of this tripe, so do not read on if you want to savor this for yourself. I will say one nice thing—I did like one or two little set-pieces that could have been considerably creepy if used by the right director. But from the opening scenes on, I was struck by how poorly this whole concept was played out. It’s never really clear how old the three teens are. Gigandet is older than I am and Yustman is the same age as me. Yet they all live in their parents’ huge mansions and their parents never seem to be home. However, in one classroom scene set in a lecture hall (with a benign discussion of what existed before time or some such vague hoodoo) it seems these youngins are in college. Hmmm? Which leads me to awful scene number one: Yustman babysitting. Whether or not she’s in college, the little boy she’s sitting manages to bitch-slap her and utter the awful line “Jumby wants to be born.” Several instances later and Yustman is fake-girl-crying/screeching, “He said….Jumby wants to be born!” Oh, the horror! Yes, I laughed. I was thinking of Jomby from Pee-Wee’s Playhouse. I mean, come on. Jumby? Plus, Yustman keeps seeing this bedraggled little boy all over who looks like a street-sweeper from Oliver Twist, with his computer generated luminescent eyes that are supposed to be creepy. Then Yustman’s irises start to change into this color.
Well then! the plot takes another nosedive when Yustman visits the eye doctor who tells her she may have been a twin. Lo and Behold! She asks her busy bee dad, who informs her that in utero, her umbilical cord strangled her twin brother. Evil bitch. This upsets Yustman so much, she digs through some old things in some readily accessible room in her pristine home and finds a news clipping that leads her to Jane Alexander. Yustman discovers that Alexander is her grandma, and she’s Jewish. Sacre Bleu! Her grandma was a fraternal twin in Auschwitz and the street urchin Yustman keeps seeing is her great-uncle, (grandma’s bro), who Dr. Mengele killed by presumably injecting some kind of glowing radioactive material into his eyeballs. Well, the little boy died but then came back possessed by the aforementioned Jewish demon. Right, right, I buy it. EXCEPT that anyone who knows anything about Mengele knows his real interest was with IDENTICAL twins. But I guess he probably killed a load of frats (I also loved the flashback sequence in which the twins arrive at Auschwitz, are offered candy, and also have pristine, un-stained blue mittens). Anyhow, Jane somehow pushed the spirit back to somewhere, something mumble mumble (it’s never divulged) and then it came back to get the twins in Jane’s daughter’s tummy (but Yustman’s fetus took care of that!) and now, an unsaid, undisclosed number of years have passed and it wants Yustman. Finally! This twin angle----I had a big problem with it. “Twins are like mirrors. And mirrors are gateways.” Yeah, yeah, yeah. Identical twins are mirrors, not fraternal twins (e.g., not mirror images). And then, the second laugh out loud line, coming from Alexander, “The dybbuk has a taste for our family’s blood.” Oh, now it’s all clear to me. Hence, this is an anti-Semitic horror movie, a new type of J-horror, if you will. What am I supposed to think? A demon possesses a dead Jewish twin in a concentration camp and continues to harass and molest these poor Jewish ladies because why? They’re JEWISH! Nazi demon. Apparently the demon is unaware that there are plenty of Jewish twins to needlessly possess. If anyone cares to be offended, spread the word, I guess.
Finally, the in-congruencies. First, the neighbor child that keeps popping up (also the ugliest kid I think I’ve seen in film---only because he looks a little down-syndromey---he actually isn’t special, so I think it’s okay to stick with ugly/homely), it’s never explained why he gets possessed. He’s not a twin…….soooo....
Second, there’s a scene where Yustman and her boyfriend go out dancing at a club. She, of course, has a histrionic episode in the bathroom (which no other young ladies use in at least an 8 minute time span---a bit unrealistic). Afterwards, Yustman’s at home, chatting and crying and cooing at her girlfriend online. Then she goes to bed. Then she sleeps long enough to have a nightmare. Then her grandma calls her to come over as she needs to see something. Then Yustman exclaims, “But it’s midnight!” Really? I guess when I go clubbing at 4PM I can accomplish a lot by midnight, too.
And in that bathroom scene, a bunch of potato bugs soaked in poopy liquid crawl all over Yustman. In fact, potato bugs pop up all over. This is never explained and there aren’t any potatoes. (These are actually Jerusalem crickets---and they don’t have any strange ties to Jews, demons, or anything evil---as you can see, this awful director made me want to check the facts).
I also found it funny that Gary Oldman has to blow through a big mammoth horn before beginning his Hebrew chanting during the exorcism—how Celtic. Another fun moment was when the audience learns that Yustman’s reference book (which she seemingly steals from the public library) is called “The Book of Mirrors,” (which sounds like a quick read at least) and is technically a book about Kabbalah mysticism. And then it dawned on me---Madonna may have, just may have had a hand in writing this awful little jaundiced turpitude. And maybe she was credited under a pseudonym---you know, an Alan Smithee kinda thing. Ru Paul calls her Madogma. I say Madybbuk.
Also, our film’s heroine can’t even do everything she’s told. Alexander tells her to smash every mirror in the house, burn the broken pieces, then bury them in the back yard. Voila, regenerated hair growth. My dybbuk instructed me to do the same. No luck. But the film blatantly shows us that Yustman neglected to burn ALL of the mirror pieces. Bitch is asking for it.
One last final thought….before I tell you to ignore this film…..I was initially excited about hearing there was a new horror movie called The Unborn. Immediately, I though to myself, “YES! A Remake of that Brooke Adams movie from the early 90’s!” If you saw it, (I’m chuckling to myself), maybe you’ll understand. I never cared for Adams, (she was a little blank, and, frankly, homely, as if she were Annabella Sciorra’s janky sister) but the film, directed by B-Schlockmeister Roger Corman, has some amazingly bad views on abortion, creepy mutant-killer babies, and motherhood obsession—all themes I wouldn’t mind cinematically revisiting (I love It’s Alive – 1974). Most thrilling of all in 1991’s The Unborn: Kathy Griffin as a lesbian, getting clunked to death with a hammer.
It’s odd, but this film fits into the strange phenomenon of Holocaust/WWII themed films that opened over the past several months: Good, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, Valkyrie, Defiance, The Reader, etc. Are any of these in German? No. I haven’t seen all of these (I just can’t bring myself to give Tom Cruise money at the box office) but I’m going to be a slippery slope (no pun intended) and say that they were all relatively better than The Unborn, which went wrong in so many ways, I have to devise a plan of attack.
The CAST: Let’s begin with the film’s pretty little lead, Odette Yustman, who bravely portrays a young teenager who is in danger of being possessed by, what is colloquially referred to, as a dybbuk (which is, roughly, a Jewish demon). Ms. Yustman was previously blasted across our cinema screens in last year’s Cloverfield, which I will admit is less irritating, but still a trial in logical patience. She was the young lady whom the hero had to trek across the city to rescue because he had seemingly shagged her months before, and thereby caused the death of all his vacuous disciples while en route. Ms. Yustman’s performance in this new schlock-fest is, for lack of a better word, garbage. It’s about on par with Jessica Alba’s turn in The Eye. (To tell the truth, most of Alba’s astute characterizations come across as though she really were blind). Sadly, Yustman has the most screen time, the worst dialogue and I really wanted to tell the demon to possess a less bland and boring Jewish girl.
Next, we have Jane Alexander. Yes, that’s the same Oscar nominated Jane from The Great White Hope (1970), All the President’s Men (1976), Kramer Vs. Kramer (1979), and Testament (1983). So what’s she doing here? Well, Jane was nice and creepy in her small role in The Ring (2002), but here, she comes across a little silly, what with her faux-German accent, clutching a pointy Jewish star in the nursing home and being saddled with explaining just what silly shenanigans are happening to the film’s heroine. She strangely resembles Anjelica Huston in her nursing home scenes from Choke (2008), but in that film, Huston also played herself in the twenty-year flashbacks. Hmmmm.
Next stop on the Pointless Express is the boyfriend, played Cam Gigandet, who had to have a few shirtless scenes in order to elevate the dullness of his presence. Mr. Gigandet was also in another of 2008’s worst films, Twilight.
The saddest travesty of The Unborn, cast-wise? GARY OLDMAN. What the hell, Gary? Couldn’t they have found a more believable Jewish rabbi? Was it the writer’s strike Gary? I mean, this is the man that was in The Professional (1994) and True Romance (1993). And all those god-help-me-isn’t-the-last-one-filmed-yet Harry Potter movies! I’m guessing that the director, who got screenwriter cred for The Dark Knight (2008), somehow manipulated or drugged Mr. Oldman into performing in this debauchery. Or like poor Gina Gershon in Showgirls (1995), maybe he just didn’t read the script. Either way, his faux-Jewish wig-hair-do and the exorcism scene made me wish this was straight to DVD for Gary’s sake. And almost not worthy of complaining about is Carla Gugino (Sin City – 2008; Spy Kids – 2001), who barely blips onto screen in flashbacks as Yustman’s mentally deranged mother who hanged herself. Maybe someone did read the script.
The PLOT: (SPOILER ALERT). Now I am sorry if I ruin the phantasmagorical anti-climactic elements of this tripe, so do not read on if you want to savor this for yourself. I will say one nice thing—I did like one or two little set-pieces that could have been considerably creepy if used by the right director. But from the opening scenes on, I was struck by how poorly this whole concept was played out. It’s never really clear how old the three teens are. Gigandet is older than I am and Yustman is the same age as me. Yet they all live in their parents’ huge mansions and their parents never seem to be home. However, in one classroom scene set in a lecture hall (with a benign discussion of what existed before time or some such vague hoodoo) it seems these youngins are in college. Hmmm? Which leads me to awful scene number one: Yustman babysitting. Whether or not she’s in college, the little boy she’s sitting manages to bitch-slap her and utter the awful line “Jumby wants to be born.” Several instances later and Yustman is fake-girl-crying/screeching, “He said….Jumby wants to be born!” Oh, the horror! Yes, I laughed. I was thinking of Jomby from Pee-Wee’s Playhouse. I mean, come on. Jumby? Plus, Yustman keeps seeing this bedraggled little boy all over who looks like a street-sweeper from Oliver Twist, with his computer generated luminescent eyes that are supposed to be creepy. Then Yustman’s irises start to change into this color.
Well then! the plot takes another nosedive when Yustman visits the eye doctor who tells her she may have been a twin. Lo and Behold! She asks her busy bee dad, who informs her that in utero, her umbilical cord strangled her twin brother. Evil bitch. This upsets Yustman so much, she digs through some old things in some readily accessible room in her pristine home and finds a news clipping that leads her to Jane Alexander. Yustman discovers that Alexander is her grandma, and she’s Jewish. Sacre Bleu! Her grandma was a fraternal twin in Auschwitz and the street urchin Yustman keeps seeing is her great-uncle, (grandma’s bro), who Dr. Mengele killed by presumably injecting some kind of glowing radioactive material into his eyeballs. Well, the little boy died but then came back possessed by the aforementioned Jewish demon. Right, right, I buy it. EXCEPT that anyone who knows anything about Mengele knows his real interest was with IDENTICAL twins. But I guess he probably killed a load of frats (I also loved the flashback sequence in which the twins arrive at Auschwitz, are offered candy, and also have pristine, un-stained blue mittens). Anyhow, Jane somehow pushed the spirit back to somewhere, something mumble mumble (it’s never divulged) and then it came back to get the twins in Jane’s daughter’s tummy (but Yustman’s fetus took care of that!) and now, an unsaid, undisclosed number of years have passed and it wants Yustman. Finally! This twin angle----I had a big problem with it. “Twins are like mirrors. And mirrors are gateways.” Yeah, yeah, yeah. Identical twins are mirrors, not fraternal twins (e.g., not mirror images). And then, the second laugh out loud line, coming from Alexander, “The dybbuk has a taste for our family’s blood.” Oh, now it’s all clear to me. Hence, this is an anti-Semitic horror movie, a new type of J-horror, if you will. What am I supposed to think? A demon possesses a dead Jewish twin in a concentration camp and continues to harass and molest these poor Jewish ladies because why? They’re JEWISH! Nazi demon. Apparently the demon is unaware that there are plenty of Jewish twins to needlessly possess. If anyone cares to be offended, spread the word, I guess.
Finally, the in-congruencies. First, the neighbor child that keeps popping up (also the ugliest kid I think I’ve seen in film---only because he looks a little down-syndromey---he actually isn’t special, so I think it’s okay to stick with ugly/homely), it’s never explained why he gets possessed. He’s not a twin…….soooo....
Second, there’s a scene where Yustman and her boyfriend go out dancing at a club. She, of course, has a histrionic episode in the bathroom (which no other young ladies use in at least an 8 minute time span---a bit unrealistic). Afterwards, Yustman’s at home, chatting and crying and cooing at her girlfriend online. Then she goes to bed. Then she sleeps long enough to have a nightmare. Then her grandma calls her to come over as she needs to see something. Then Yustman exclaims, “But it’s midnight!” Really? I guess when I go clubbing at 4PM I can accomplish a lot by midnight, too.
And in that bathroom scene, a bunch of potato bugs soaked in poopy liquid crawl all over Yustman. In fact, potato bugs pop up all over. This is never explained and there aren’t any potatoes. (These are actually Jerusalem crickets---and they don’t have any strange ties to Jews, demons, or anything evil---as you can see, this awful director made me want to check the facts).
I also found it funny that Gary Oldman has to blow through a big mammoth horn before beginning his Hebrew chanting during the exorcism—how Celtic. Another fun moment was when the audience learns that Yustman’s reference book (which she seemingly steals from the public library) is called “The Book of Mirrors,” (which sounds like a quick read at least) and is technically a book about Kabbalah mysticism. And then it dawned on me---Madonna may have, just may have had a hand in writing this awful little jaundiced turpitude. And maybe she was credited under a pseudonym---you know, an Alan Smithee kinda thing. Ru Paul calls her Madogma. I say Madybbuk.
Also, our film’s heroine can’t even do everything she’s told. Alexander tells her to smash every mirror in the house, burn the broken pieces, then bury them in the back yard. Voila, regenerated hair growth. My dybbuk instructed me to do the same. No luck. But the film blatantly shows us that Yustman neglected to burn ALL of the mirror pieces. Bitch is asking for it.
One last final thought….before I tell you to ignore this film…..I was initially excited about hearing there was a new horror movie called The Unborn. Immediately, I though to myself, “YES! A Remake of that Brooke Adams movie from the early 90’s!” If you saw it, (I’m chuckling to myself), maybe you’ll understand. I never cared for Adams, (she was a little blank, and, frankly, homely, as if she were Annabella Sciorra’s janky sister) but the film, directed by B-Schlockmeister Roger Corman, has some amazingly bad views on abortion, creepy mutant-killer babies, and motherhood obsession—all themes I wouldn’t mind cinematically revisiting (I love It’s Alive – 1974). Most thrilling of all in 1991’s The Unborn: Kathy Griffin as a lesbian, getting clunked to death with a hammer.
Nice analysis Nick, I didn't read it all because of the spoilers, though I can't imagine I'll be seeing this anytime soon so....Oh well.
ReplyDeleteDavid Goyer has somehow developed a good career with minimal talent, I'm pretty sure he was not the brains behind the two latest Batman films, but somehow he gets to work with Nolan brother. Ugh.
This does look like a big, steaming pile of poo
Erik
Thanks to you, I will never be able to listen to Madonna again without thinking "Madybbuk!"
ReplyDelete