Mirror Mirror 2: Raven Dance

Very tepid horror movie, if you can even call it that. A tale about a mirror which is supposed to be evil but it does little more than emit weird sounds and drip some blood from time to time. There is scarcely any acting, and the only good thing I can think about the movie is that the dance scenes and the music were pretty cool, although far from good. I have never seen the first movie, Mirror Mirror, but it can't be worse than this one.

The sequel to the (fondly remembered, in some quarters) 1990 horror flick "Mirror Mirror" could give you cause to wonder if the producers of it made a Faustian bargain of their own with the haunted mirror in the movie. It's like they asked for above-par cinematography and actors, but didn't realise that granting this wish would also put their screenplay through a paper-shredder.

The original "Mirror Mirror" didn't seem to know what to do with the whole "haunted mirror grants dark powers that help you get revenge" premise, so instead it fell back on a few generic horror movie death scenes where pipes sprung leaks and killed naked 20-something high school students. The sequel, on the other hand, more completely embraces its concept, showing people conversing with the mirror as if there were someone on the other side.

This doesn't help much, though. The movie is too disjointed, with weird flourishes of dancing and ravens that do nothing but signal to the viewer that they can stop paying attention because nothing important is going to happen for the next few moments. It feels like the director reaching beyond their grasp. Like they are trying to achieve something transcendent and haunting with the ballet and the raven.

They fail, dismally.

The plot is something to do with a young ballerina and her violinist brother who lose their parents in an accident and are sent to stay with a bunch of nuns. Their much older stepsister(played by Sally Kellerman from MASH) is out to get their inheritance, aided by an evil doctor played by Roddy McDowall. An oily drifter played by a young Mark Ruffalo is there to save the day, however.

William Sanderson (of Blade Runner and Deadwood) is the only actor from the first movie who returns, and he seems to be playing a different character here. I wasn't really sure who his character was, or what he was doing in the movie - but then his inclusion didn't make much sense in the first movie, either.

Unlike the original movie, there is no nudity (or sex) in "Mirror Mirror 2", and I can hardly remember any violence. There was one thing I hadn't seen before, however: a knight depicted in stain-glass windows comes to life. I don't think I have ever seen stained-glass animated before.

The demon that lives in the mirror again shows up at the end of the movie, and we get a better look at him. He's pretty unimpressive looking.

This sequel doesn't have a whole lot to recommend it, frankly. Does anyone watch horror movies for their cinematography or music? Do you?

I liked the old VHS box more than the movie. It has one of those shifting-picture covers; a woman sits in front of a mirror in her underwear, turns and screams at a raven breaking through the glass of the mirror. The mirror does look like the one in the movie; the woman doesn't.

In a prologue, a woman is in a room with nuns, and a mirror covered by a sheet. The mirror distresses her, and she wants it to be destroyed with a knife. One of the nuns scoffs, uncovers it, and loses her sight.

Years later, a young woman dancer and her retarded violinist brother are staying at the same place. A metal/punk band is rehearsing there for some reason, and all get charred during a lightning storm after they bring the mirror out of a closet and uncover it. There are a pair of legs hanging from the ceiling in this room, which can be seen in several scenes in the movie, and I don't know why.

The siblings' parents have died, and they're staying at this nunnery or orphanage where there are no other children. The girl's much older stepsister arrives with her doctor and they try to manipulate her health and mental health in ways that will result in the stepsister obtaining the inheritance (she'd been left out entirely). They hire a janitor (of the nunnery? or elsewhere?) or outsider artist to help them, but he doesn't do much. He's played by William Sanderson, who was in the first movie, but he's playing a different character here.

The dancer falls in love with the mirror, and the brother seems to like it initially, then doesn't. Mostly he whines a lot. A young man named Christian seems to appear and disappear, and he seems to be related to the mirror in some way.

There are some short scenes where some toys are animated that are nicely done, and there's a scene where the dancer's vision is blurred and her bed seems to be undulating that was neat, if brief. I don't know if this was done with a camera or post-production effect, or if they made the bed movie. One of the death scenes copies one of the more memorable scenes from Young Sherlock Holmes (1985).

As others have said, there are dancing scenes in the movie, and there is a raven who keeps showing up to attack people or cause them to have accidents, but there isn't a "raven dance" whatever that might be. Oddly, the title of the movie is Raven Dance. It's the video box cover that is Mirror Mirror 2: "Raven Dance." The end credits say something like "Raven Dance from the tales of Mirror, Mirror."

The ending is really stupid, almost of the "it was all a dream" variety with a slight twist. There's a scene after the last of the credits have rolled of three monks in a room standing by a slanted table covered with candles. One of the monks face cannot be seen at all (the others, only barely), and his right hand seems to be skeletal while his left seems to be fine (one of the characters in the movie does lose a hand...). They seem to be talking backwards. It's only a few seconds long. I have no idea how it connects with the rest of the movie!

I may watch parts three and four sometime, if only to see how they compare.

The first film, released in 1990, was no great peak of horror, nor storytelling or film-making generally, but it was suitably well made and enjoyable. It also felt a lot like something that could've been easily mistaken for a Charles Band production with the somewhat middling nature of most facets, from basic production values and music to the way that dialogue, scenes, and characters were written. And, well, then one sits to watch the sequel. Let me speak plainly: this immediately comes off as substantially weaker, an inferior revisit of a less than stellar product. There are some recognizable names and faces involved, and we know what they're capable of, but between what was very apparently a modest budget and the seemingly unpracticed skills of some chief figures the end result is tiresomely flimsy right from the start. 'Raven dance' is just sadly just not very good.

While Jimmy Lifton produced the predecessor, this was his first work as a director, and to be frank, it shows. The direction readily comes off as scattered and inconsistent (but mostly just meager). In turn the acting is highly variable in its quality (but mostly just unconvincing); in fairness, I wonder about the skills of some of the actors in the first place. The plot at large feels very forced (and sometimes almost downright incohesive), and the scene writing shares all these mentioned qualities while also often seeming unfinished - part of an idea, but not fully conjured. It goes without saying that all this applies to the dialogue, too, and as an aside, please note a content warning for substantial, ugly ableist language. The pacing was lax in 1990; in 1994 it's rather slothful. 'Mirror mirror II' relies a lot more on post-production effects, and as these evidently received the least portion of those resources available to the feature, they do not come off well.

This was only Mark Ruffalo's first full-length film, but in all honesty even in a supporting part he acts circles around all his co-stars, especially (but definitely not limited to) Veronica Cartwright and Lois Nettleton. To whatever extent Lifton's direction can be faulted for the bad performances, the cast obviously share some responsibility, too. I guess the art direction is easy on the eyes, and the choreography; of all things the cinematography is unexpectedly strong. The costume design, hair, and makeup are nice. But then, Lifton's music is mostly even more bland here than it was the first time around, with only bits and pieces of real flavor. While there may be some good ideas in the screenplay Lifton concocted with Virginia Perfili, they are very few, and quite meek in the first place. And I must repeat that by and large the writing is just feeble, and though I'll grant some allowances based on Lifton's inexperience as a director, there's no getting around how flimsy his work is in that capacity.

The more the plot advances, the more deeply questionable and unbelievable that it is. A moment at the start of the third act, precipitating the remainder and specifically "mirroring" a similar instance from the first movie, is terribly contrived for the fact that there's no build-up to it. It's not even firmly, plausibly established why Marlee and Jeffrey are at the "Catholic orphanage" in the first place when literally no one else is. I guess we're just intended to take all this at face value, but I have a very hard time doing that. And for whatever violence, blood, gore, and otherwise horror the previous title may have offered, it's worth observing that there's just simply less of it in this followup. My expectations were mixed to low when I sat to watch, and still I'm rather confounded by how astonishingly unsteady, languid, and limp this picture is. It doesn't make a good impression at the outset, and it only ever gets worse; I'd say the ending is at least appreciable, except it's unabashedly imitative. Whatever it is you're looking for in 'Mirror mirror II,' I really just don't think you're going to find it, and there are far, far better ways to spend your time.

RAVEN DANCE is a typical straight-to-video horror sequel of the early 1990s, made without much in the way of a plot and with a heavy emphasis on style which has dated plenty since this film's first release. The inspiration here seems to be the first two in the HELLRAISER series in terms of lighting and set dressing, but the effect is far from the same: this is pedestrian, uninteresting, and entirely forgettable. Once more there's a cursed mirror and a few bloody death and cheesy computer effects, the best bit being when stained glass comes to life, but mostly it's all talk and boring characterisation. Roddy McDowell sleepwalks through a villain role and William Sanderson lends his typically kooky presence to the proceedings, although for modern viewers the most fun comes from seeing Mark Ruffalo acting right at the outset of his career.