Clinger

Saw this at Nevermore Film Festival in Durham, NC last weekend. I thought it was one of the highlights of the festival.

It's difficult to set the right tone for a comic horror film, but this one hits the mark. Of course, it helped to see it on the big screen in a sold-out theater.

I have to applaud the writer - clever dialog and jokes along with the scares. And the actors were all great - with close to a star-making performance from Jennifer Laporte as Fern. Vincent Martella as her first boyfriend Robert was also good - somehow walking the fine line between youthful earnestness and creepy obsession. There was appropriate time spent to make their relationship awkward and touching, like real teenagers.

The writer was generous enough to provide even the supporting cast with great lines and character arcs. For instance, Fern's sister could have been a thankless role - providing easy jokes as a stereotypical airhead. But she has her own interesting subplot. And the track coach was an inspired creation - flawed, but strong and wonderful.

I also liked the flashbacks, animated to resemble a child's crayon drawings. And the plot continued to build to a satisfying conclusion -- another trick that's not so easy to pull off. Very impressive.

"Clinger" has a pretty straight forward story with some really dark, but funny humor written into its classic boy-meets-girl prose. While the acting is decent, and the characters are somewhat developed, a lot of the moments fall flat. I am really not sure why but during the more comedic scenes either the timing, or delivery is just not strong. And yet from a contrast point of view, the scenes that are just casual character development have a natural quality and ease that really delivers Steves and Gabi Duncombe's (writer) vision.

There are plenty of funny moments, especially during the more physical comedy scenes that are also the horror scenes. The horror comedy aspect of "Clinger" is reminiscent of recent films like "Boy Eats Girl" with its all-out "stereotyped" gag humor, but the characters themselves are a bit more witty much like the characters in classic films such as "Election" with Reese Witherspoon. "Clinger" really has some nice moments. Of course most of the moments come with the bloody, death scenes, interactions between the living and the dead-that usually ends in someone getting hurt, and a few of the actors that just own their characters.

The special effects are above par considering the budget. A lot of the stuff is CGI supported gory elements, but there is equal parts practical effects in the film too. Usually I trash films for relying on CGI to give us the horror but when a film is paranormal (ghosty) in nature I tend to find it acceptable and quite frankly necessary. Plus the effects team, and Steves balanced the CGI, practical effects nicely. And there was enough blood spray and splatter in the film to make any horror fan happy. The musical score wasn't that impressive, actually I don't think any song or sound effects sequence really stuck out to me personally. It doesn't suck-it just wasn't that impressive. Overall "Clinger" is a horror comedy worth checking out. I enjoyed the horror elements way more than the comedy stuff, but everything balances out in this one, and the cast are really committed to their characters.

Horror Comedies have a reputation of either being great or terrible, the mix of genres can work and has in the past but a lot of the times (especially in low budget films) the comedy just seems forced and lame. With Clinger (a new horror comedy from first time director Michael Steves) there are glimpses of a really good movie, but there are also a lot of very sloppy attempts at comedy.

The story follows Fern Peterson (player by Jennifer Laporte who did a really good job in her first feature film), Fern meets Robert Klingher (played by Vincent Martella who is best known for his appearance in the show "Everybody Hates Chris"), Fern and Robert are both fairly inexperienced when it comes to dating and they quickly fall for each other. Everything goes great at first but Robert begins to become much more invested in the relationship than Fern, it doesn't take Fern long to realize that it's time to break things off with Robert. However during the break up Robert is killed in a freak accident, now he is back as a ghost and more obsessed than ever. I really liked the plot line, it's one of the best parts of the movie in my opinion. They really do a good job of capturing the awkwardness of teenage relationships and that really gave the movie some charm.

While there is a decent amount of stuff to like in "Clinger" there is also quite a bit of stuff that really throws the film off and prevents it from being great. One of the big negatives that really stood out for me was the fact the two of the characters (Fern's Sister and Fern's Coach) were extremely obnoxious. You can tell that these were the two characters that were suppose to bring most of the laughs, everything they say is an attempt at comedy but 95% of it fell flat on me and after a while it just got really annoying. There are definitely some funny parts in the film, the more subtle jokes and even some of the psychical comedy worked really well, but too many times the film tried a bit too hard to be hilarious.

Parts of "Clinger" were extremely fun, gory, and entertaining as hell, unfortunately a few poor characters and a few too many bad jokes really prevented this from being a great low budget gem. Nevertheless this was still an entertaining Horror/Comedy, just a few steps away from being more than that.

5.5/10

Usually when I hand out such low ratings it means the film annoyed me in some way, but this is simply too formulaic, predictable and mostly uninteresting. The gags are not all trash, there's a solid idea here and there, but most of them are primitive. The film is kind of inoffensive in its low-budget naivety, but it's just doesn't maintain interest.

The male lead is the film's only major travesty: this kid stems from a wealthy pizza-chain clan, so yes, another example of how privileged and elitist the movie world is, and not just in the States. Because who the hell would cast this guy if he didn't have cash and connections? He's got less charisma than a chair or even Daniel Radcliffe - another elitist. He looks like a cross between Bruce Springsteen and Jay Berger. Just imagine if a Springsteen cloning experiment went wrong and Bruce jr turned out with an even more twisted lower jaw. If I tell you that Ben Stiller is more of a stud - and taller - than this nerd, would you laugh or accuse me of exaggeration? Bloody hell, at first I thought he was 14! Turns out he was in his 20s here. That poor girl, having had to kiss this guy, over and over! Just for that I'd shower her with awards.

Speaking of which, why the stupid name? Fern. What kind of a damn stupid name is that? That name did annoy me, come to think of it, as did that damn awful love-song the pizza kid kept singing.

I watched Clinger via Amazon Prime and thought it was entertaining. It did look fairly low budget, but I feel like that was part of the charm of it and it helped forgive the less than stellar performances.. this isn't to knock it, I feel like a lot of my favorite movies out there are a little rough around the edges (ala: Clerks)

I do feel like the script was pretty good and I really enjoyed the protagonist, Fern-- definitely far from a prop and that in itself deserves a big thumbs up. I'd recommend watching it, it's best for young teenagers-- it's a high school story with bad words, perfect for 13/14 year olds. If you're looking for something spooky and high brow- this isn't the movie for you. It's campy and held together with gaff tape and pizza-- and they don't try to hide it; which is why this movie stands out among other indie horrors who try the Hollywood version of (name Hollywood horror movie).