Clinical

I'll admit to being drawn into "Clinical" for its first 45 minutes. The plot, centering around a disillusioned psychiatrist reluctantly taking on a PTSD patient after her last go-around with an "intensive" client ended badly, offers up enough questions and mystique to lock you in. Then, somewhere around the hour mark, the film dives headfirst into a cheap plot twist that signals the film's narrative decline. The film dispenses with logic and heads into the rabbit hole, offering up a preposterous conclusion that destroys anything it previously had going for it. Twists in stories can often be used to wondrous effect, or they can derail your narrative into muck and make you wish the writer had played it straight. Often, you'll find it would have been a much better film had it dispensed with the shock factor and stuck to its guns. Such is the case with "Clinical."

I won't consider it a spoiler to say that, towards the end, things happen that beg a big "Huh?" from viewers. It's probably not a good sign for the writer when the character discovers a dead body and the viewer has to stop and ask themselves who the person is. Nor is the film in any way forthcoming about providing coherent answers to many of these questions. I'm not a lazy viewer. I don't demand a long, complicated piece of exposition to tell me everything, nor do I think all films should answer every question. But when so much of your story hinges on certain plot elements that you don't bother to fully elucidate in your narrative, the viewer can be left feeling a bit cheated. Much like the feeling one gets when a film ends before we see a proper conclusion to various plot threads that the writer has asked us to care about. Really, it's just not nice.

"Clinical" could have been something worthwhile, but ultimately the script lets the entire venture derail into frustrating ambiguity and lazy writing, offering up no compensation for the befuddled viewer who, by film's end, is left wondering why they even cared in the first place.

It was a nice movie with a very bad ending part. Without the last 20 minutes it was good but with that end, i am sorry... Nothing more than 6

Clinical starts off intriguing. The two leads (Vinessa. Shaw and Kevin. Rahm) do a good job as traumatized psychiatrist and disfigured car accident victim seeking help. We get flashbacks of events that lead both of them into their current state as PTSD sufferers. We feel empathy for these characters. They are having a miserable Christmas holiday.

For the first hour of the movie the action is brief and scares tantalizingly short. That's okay with me. I love a slow burn IF the action can build in a logical way and deliver a shocking payoff. Clinical doesn't do that.

Dr. Mathis and Alex reveal their mental and physical injury side by side, It seems a bond will form between them. Alex gets more demanding of her time and the doctor grows uneasy continuing to treat him at her house. We know their is something connecting the two and we want to know more about it. The disturbed and violent Nora (India Eisley) is the key.

As events progress, they make less and less sense. The last part of Clinical degenerates into the typical psycho-chasing-woman-around-the-house gore fest. We've all seen that too many times. I almost blacked out rolling my eyes at the screen.

Clinical has a nice set up. A story that promised and intelligent exploration of trauma and memory ended in disappointment. 5 out of 10, sorry.

Interesting story but too slow and a bad ending , I would not watch it again

Started out optimistic that this might be interesting, but quickly became disappointed. I know this film is supposed to have elements of both a psychological thriller and horror, but in all brutal honesty, I felt like this movie made light of mental illness and does not take it seriously almost using horror to make fun of it. That's what bothered me the most about it. Certain things were too stereotyped (inaccurately stereotyped too) and the plot went nowhere. The plot moves slow and then takes a quick turn and everything unwinds rapidly, almost like watching 2 separate films. Little character development. I would not recommend this film, especially not at night if you are alone.