Claustrophobia

Having enjoyed writer/director Mark Tapio Kines's debut film FOREIGN CORRESPONDENTS, I was ready for something in the same vein -- haunting, sardonic, even lyrical. Fortunately these qualities are evident enough in CLAUSTROPHOBIA to confirm that it's the same creative mind at work. What the film truly delivers, however, is pure and simple paranoia -- an intelligent and very creepy thriller that inventively plays with genre conventions. All of the basic ingredients are there: a house with three cute young women trapped inside (Mary Lynn Raskjub is the most watchable for my money), a faceless killer with a signature weapon, a couple of unfortunate bystanders. It's what Kines does with the material that gives the movie its hard edge. The action plays out in real time, in the suburban neighborhood next door, and -- a counter-intuitive but surprisingly effective move -- almost entirely in daylight. The pacing favors slow terror over shocks, remorselessly closing the walls in around the characters (hence the title). There are no "rules" governing who lives or dies: as in real life, the violence is jagged, haphazard, and mutely disturbing. The surprise ending is a "banality of evil" twist worthy of Gus Van Sant's ELEPHANT or Terence Malick's BADLANDS. Altogether a fine journeyman outing from a filmmaker who gives spooky detachment a good name.

There is no word terrible enough to describe this movie. Every single solitary aspect of it was pitiful and completely senseless. The acting was of the worst of I've ever seen, the directing was the official worst I've seen and don't even get me started on the script writers. On the cover of the DVD case I got out I read one review that said "The best straight to video movie of the year" well for the sake of movie lovers everywhere I severely, severely hope this was not the case. I mean you can't tell me NONE of these obviously middle class, decent job occupying, love to talk women have a cell phone. I honestly reckon I could sit here for around 3 hours typing up problems with this movie movie but I won't bother because it wasn't worth it. All I'll say is please, please for future movies sake DO NOT GET THIS FILM OUT!!!

A crossbow killer terrifies a suburban community, and his latest targets are three co-workers house-sitting for the weekend. Lauren (Melanie Lynskey), the optimist, has invited her department from work, but only two show up: socially awkward Grace (Mary Lynn Rajskub), who's terrified of leaving her house, and outspoken Gina (Sheeri Rappaport), who expected a bigger crowd, and doesn't want to be stuck with these two all weekend. Their unease with each other soon yields to the awful possibility that they might be the serial killer's next victims, as the telltale signs of his modus operandi accumulate. This is a low-budget movie that makes good use of its "claustrophobic" production by turning a few horror conventions on its head. It substitutes bright, unfiltered daylight for night, obscuring the stalker while making his targets vulnerable; they can't escape while their every movement is visible. The women are trapped without electricity, shrouding them with natural indoor lighting and shrinking their environment even further. Ambient sound is kept to a minimum, to make room for the smallest aural clues of the killer's presence. Occasionally it's punctuated by the trampling of the stalker's feet overhead, which seems to mirror their nervous, galloping heartbeats. The three actresses play well off each other, with lots of comic interplay to relieve the tension. Grace seems thrive on nervousness, while Melanie plays the calm at the center of the storm. Sheeri's performance covers the emotional extremes. She projects her feelings of frustration, rage, and despair, and it seems as if it's on behalf of all three. She takes a confrontational approach with everyone, including the killer, and as a result, is able to discover the true face of the terror that hunts them. While "Claustrophobia" uses some of the same imagery of serial killer movies, its approach is lighter and more playful, and manages to avoid resorting to cheap exploitation, without sacrificing the sense of intimacy with the characters necessary to relate to their terrifying experience. Maybe that's because it seems its subtext is empathy: Even as their community remains ignorant of what's happening in broad daylight,the killer seems to understand their every weakness, to prey on them. Meanwhile, the "shooter" on the opposite end, the camera, seems to work against the killer's agenda, trying to avoid taking his point of view, and not allowing the three women to be reduced to mere targets. Because of this approach, we're not so much voyeurs while watching this, but participants. Sheeri Rappaport wrote of her experiences in earlier horror film, "Little Witches", of the difficulty in starring in a movie where the agenda and desires of the producer and the audience can be very different than that of the performer. `Claustrophobia' seems to offer an opportunity for all three points of view to meet on common ground. I recommend this not only as a horror film, but also as a unique take on the genre, and a good opportunity to see these actresses in a different light. Don't forget to turn the sound up!

Claustrophobia (2003)

** (out of 4)

A small neighborhood in Los Angeles is struck in terror when a maniac starts climbing on people's roofs and shooting them with a crossbow pistol. The town is in a panic and the police don't have a clue to what's going on because the killer doesn't have a motive and no clues were left at the crime scenes. Thankfully three girls decide to throw a slumber party and the killer just happens to show up. With the darkness falling, the three girls must find a way out of the house.

You might remember this movie under its original titles of Claustrophobia but no matter the title the film really isn't worth troubling yourself with, although there are a few interesting aspect that die-hard horror fans might want to check out. The most interesting thing is that actress Judith O'Dea makes her first screen appearance since her role as Barbara in George Romero's Night of the Living Dead. It's somewhat shocking she didn't do any films between these two but here she is in case you want to know what she looks like today.

The rest of the film really doesn't have enough interesting aspect to get any sort of recommendation but I do think director Mark Tapio Kines could make a good movie given a good cast and a higher budget. The film was shot digital and to me this is a death kiss to many low budget films because it's very hard to build any atmosphere and that's a problem here. Another issue is the actual look of digital and for a low budget horror movie, the graininess and ugliness of video can always make for a more interesting movie but again, this here is lost when you're shooting digital.

Outside of that, the basic story isn't anything new and you'd be better off renting the campy The Nailgun Massacre or the cult favorite The Slumber Party Massacre since both films serve the genre a lot better. I'm sure while making these types of films the directors are aware of previous low budget films that made their debut on VHS back during the 1980's. With that in mind, why on Earth are these direct to DVD titles coming out so lame? Fans of those 80's classics enjoy them because while the stories aren't the greatest, the film at least gives you some good gore and pretty girls taking their clothes off. I'm going to guess Scream made nudity politically incorrect but this film here isn't going to be opening in two-thousand theaters. To make up for the budget perhaps these directors should start delivering the goods.

The performances are expected to be bad but the ones here are even worse than you'd expect from this type of film. None of the characters are written good enough to where you actually care for them so it becomes rather boring watching them talk and trying to survive when in fact you're hoping they'll quickly be bumped off. Another issue is that they don't say anything interesting. Apparently the director (who was also the screenwriter) was trying to build up suspense in their talk but this doesn't come through because the girls say nothing interesting. Throughout most of the film they simply say did you hear that? which gets old.

Even with all of that, I'd almost recommend the film due to the director being able to capture a few jump scenes. I won't give the scenes away but there's one involving a window that made me jump and that isn't too easy to do. Another highlight of the film is the sound effects of the killer walking on the roof. This is a very simple effect but the director makes the most of it and it does manage to be a bit creepy. There's really nothing new or original in this flick but I respect some of the effects the director was able to create.

Following Melanie Lynskey's impressive debut in Peter Jackson's highly acclaimed Heavenly Creatures (alongside a young Kate Winslet), I expected fame and fortune to come easily for the talented actress; A-list status, however, has eluded her thus far—not at all surprising with cheap-looking shot-on-video stuff like Serial Slayer on her CV.

Melanie plays Lauren, one of a trio of work-mates who rather stupidly decides to hold a slumber party, despite a serial killer preying on young women in the area. Before the sun has even set, the three girls are terrorised by the crossbow-wielding maniac and must use their guile to try and escape.

Director Mark Tapio Kines clearly intended this film to be a work of suspense, rather than the trashy slasher that the title suggests, and instead of going down the obvious exploitative route, he attempts to make his film a tense, character driven piece that relies more on dialogue than T&A and gore. Big mistake! With a script than consists primarily of banal conversation between the young women, the film is more likely to bore than scare. Kines does handle some of the later moments of tension well, and the ending cranks up the excitement level a notch or two, suggesting that he knows how to handle certain types of scene better than others, but the majority of this film is a snooze-fest thanks to his poorly realised lofty pretensions.

Things would have been much better if there had been more action throughout, or better yet, if Kines had just relented, got Lynskey and friends down to their undies for a pillow fight (Mel's carrying a few extra pounds here, but she's still cute), and then had them graphically gutted one-by-one by the maniac.