Movie Appraisal: The Deaths of Ian Stone (2007)

The Deaths of Ian Stone surprised me. I was honestly not expecting to like this movie very much. Sad, but true. I don't like being biased against films when watching them, but I was certainly biased against this one. Maybe it was because the main character's name is Ian Stone and he looks like the exact opposite of any person I could ever even hope to like. He looks like a prick. Boy does he look like prick. Maybe it's because from the way the film was shot I really expected to find myself making fun of the movie rather than enjoying it... but... BUT!!!!!

I liked it a lot. I really thought that it was a breath of fresh air when compared to some of the Japanese horror movies I've been watching lately. Say what you will about Western Horror as a genre (and I certainly have a lot to say about it) but when it works it really does work. Now, part of it is that things actually happen in this film. It's not all about a slow buildup with little to no payoff. No, this has the gore, the excitement, the thrills, and I couldn't have been happier. It blew me away with a lot more of everything than I ever would have expected.

Now, admittedly, I have a pretty huge tolerance for bad films, but I really didn't think this was a bad film, more like it was very similar to other films and... enjoyable despite everything it had going against it. That's the keyword here: enjoyable. This movie was fun to watch, which is quite the compliment when most movies I watch are either boring, predictable, or just plain rubbish... or just so mediocre that I can't even really find insults to throw at them. The Deaths of Ian Stone was not predictable. It had a plot. It was a weird plot, granted, but it was a plot that moved and existed. It had characters that were meaningful and even felt real at times. It even had horror movie THINGS in it! It was even a little disturbing and creepy for a few seconds! I couldn't imagine giving the film more stellar praise than that! Dario Piana directed a film which actually is kind of a horror movie! YEEEEESSSSSSS!!!!

I kid.

No, seriously, I'm not kidding at all. I've been watching Japanese horror or fairly bland horror movies for the better part of two months at the moment of writing this review, and this is really a breath of fresh air (Well, this movie and They Live! but that movie is already one of the best films ever made, so... yeah.).

Is this a great movie? No, but it works as both a horror movie and a narrative. The characters are surprisingly well executed. The actors do a fantastic job. The visuals are pretty well done too. I mean, I do have some complaints, but this is such a competent film that does what it attempts to do very well. So, first off, I recommend it even if it isn't your style. As long as you enjoy kind of stupid horror with a plot, you'll probably like this well enough.

Now, what style is the film? Well, it's an odd mash-up. I was thinking a very dark The Truman Show for about half of the movie. It also reminds me of a horror version of The Matrix, or maybe more fittingly, an actually engaging Dark City. Look, I hate Dark City by the way, and The Deaths of Ian Stone actually is so much better than Dark City that Dark City should be incredibly embarrassed with itself for being one of the worst movies I've ever seen. The Deaths of Ian Stone has basically a similar plot to Dark City, but its flow, its characters, its everything is so much better. I mean, Dark City infuriated me, making me feel almost idiotic for not liking it. I felt like it was talking down to me, and I can't stand that. It was a movie I should have loved. Noir mixed with horror mixed with intelligent thought and weird occurrences? Yeah, I should have liked that... but when the first vampire thing showed up the movie just lost me... The Deaths of Ian Stone, on the other hand, drew me in enough before its (odd, but strangely interesting) reveal that I actually enjoyed the reveal. It was well set-up, well executed, and well done in general. That's more than I will ever say about freaking Dark City.

So, there are these "Harvesters" and they feed on fear and pain and death and such. Okay, it sounds like those blighters from Harry Potter, the Dementers from the prison, but I have an inkling the idea of these things existed long before Harry Potter did. I didn't really like the visual design for the Harvesters, but I liked how they were introduced and executed. It was well done and I have no real complaints about their existence. At least the world wasn't actually on a rock floating in goddamn space...

Sorry, I'm still bitter...

Anyway, the movie is basically what it says on the tin: dude named Ian Stone dies a lot. Bam. We're done here. Let's pack it up and go home. That's a show.

Okay... all right... I guess I'm not done yet. Let me compose myself a little here. Thoughts of Dark City have made me grumpy.

Okay, well this dude named Ian Stone (played very well by Mike Vogel), who is an American living in Britain, goes through various lives and scenarios basically each day, dying through each life and also seeing the same group of people in each life and each day. As he finds himself in more and more lives he starts remembering the previous lives. (At the beginning of the movie he doesn't remember his previous lives immediately upon waking up with a new life. Later on he basically remembers everything right away.) Ian is a little confused by the whole thing and through the story we learn that he is to be killed by the Harvesters because of a memory he has within him. It's confusing, but is presented pretty well in the movie. It gets confusing at first, but then you remember the name of the movie and it gets a little clearer.

At the same time a girl named Jenny (played by Christina Cole) seems to hold the key to Ian's deaths and new lives while an odd older gentleman (played by Michael Feast) keeps showing up to tell Ian about what's going on. These stories converge when the gentleman, called "Gray," tells Ian that Ian himself is a Harvester, but no longer relies on pain, fear, or death because he fell in love, much like Gray did before. And Ian, the big softy, fell in love with Jenny, the girl who keeps showing up in his life, the girl who he keeps close to him in his various lives.

All throughout these odd revelations, a very creepy seductress Harvester named Medea (played by Jaime Murray) keeps trying to kill Ian... or at least make his life a living hell. Ian and Medea had a thing or something back in the day and she's a clingy broad and can't let go. Well, that and she's a little on the loony side. The chick is easily the scariest thing in the movie. Her expressions change so quickly that I'm surprised she doesn't get whiplash. She acts in such a way that her conviction is kind of as terrifying as her methods. I mean, the woman plays a great villain. I didn't expect that when first seeing the movie, but damn. DAMN. That's all I'll say on the matter.

The movie ends with the revelation that Ian killed an unkillable Harvester, and then he proceeds to hunt the rest of them down because that's how he rolls. The creepiness goes right out the window at that point, but I had a fun time watching him kill everybody, so I didn't mind so much.

I also enjoyed his demon Fabio hair. Human Ian has close cut hair. Harvester Ian has wonderful Fabio hair. I loved it. I loved that Fabio hair so much. I had such a question mark above my head when I saw it there, swaying to some unseen breeze like he was about to seduce everybody in the room with his ugly mug. I mean, how can you say no to hair like:

THIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh my... Ian Stone, you are a sexy man. Please, take me now. TAKE EVERYONE NOW.

Seriously. There has to either be some sort of sense of humor here or a rather large oversight in this HORROR MOVIE. I shouldn't have been laughing. I shouldn't have been laughing so hard that I couldn't breath. I shouldn't have been crying with laughter to his Fabio hair. My vision was turning red. I was losing oxygen because I thought Fabio Harvester here was the funniest thing I think I've ever actually seen in a horror movie, especially a horror movie that was pretty good. I mean, even with this rather... insanely amusing image that's never leaving my head... seducing me in my weirdest and most awful nightmares... I still liked the movie. It was just an odd... no, no... more than odd... baffling design choice. Look at his puckered lips... those soft eyes locked so far into his head... and then his beautiful hair. I don't even know what things are anymore. Why do movies do this to me? Why do they make me feel like I've lost my own mind? I'm not imagining how funny this is, right? I mean, this is actually really, really, hilarious... I think? I don't want to be the only one laughing my brains out of my skull while everybody else just kind of stares at me while I giggle about corpse Fabio seducing the dead. Oh boy, I need to stop. I think I need a long rest...

Despite the rather... awful decision that Fabioed inside of my head, the movie was pretty good, often very enjoyable. I liked the atmosphere, the acting, even the horror... though the horror was few and far between. There were some thrills though and some gore, all of which were well done. The suspense is very well executed, and I found myself more than once wondering what would happen next. The movie wasn't predictable in the slightest, and that might be the best part about it. I did find that there seemed to be a few instances of really bad CGI though, mostly with the Harvester eyes, but it only occurred a few times and only irked me slightly.

Anyway, the movie has an effective use of shadows, even if it does turn less effective as the movie progresses. It feels like a horror movie especially in the beginning. It's never really scary though, except with Medea. She actually was quite the good terrifying villain. I would not want to deal with a chick like her. I mean, seriously, when she starts going at Ian, saying she doesn't enjoy hurting or killing him, I'm thinking, "Uh-huh... tell me another one, lady. You're definitely enjoying it a little with a smile like that on your face." Because of her and her alone the hospital scene is probably the most uncomfortable and real in the entire film. It is also probably my favorite scene. Easily the scariest and it does start getting pretty good and really meta in there, which I always enjoy. I don't understand why the evil characters get all Matrixed out in sunglasses and leather, but I rolled with it despite being confused and a little weirded out (I don't like The Matrix even slightly and found the design decision odd to say the least.). Medea looked good enough in red leather that I wasn't about to complain even though I kind of wanted to complain.

Anyway, I liked this one. Even if it isn't the best movie it made an impression on me. I thoroughly enjoyed the movie, even Ian Stone's long flowing Harvester hair... no, especially Ian Stone's long flowing sexy Fabio hair. It's a movie I recommend, but realize that it's rough enough around the edges that some people may dislike it. I mean, I went into this expecting the worst, and I could certainly see other people getting the worst out of it, so take my recommendation with a fickle bit of doubt spread into your head. So... yeah. It was much better than absolutely awful which translates to me actually liking it quite a bit.

Movie Appraisal: Kakashi (案山子) (Scarecrow) (2001)

 "We co-exist with death here."

Despite the overlong introduction this movie delivers in its atmosphere. Kakashi is both moody and well directed by Norio Tsuruta, even if the story and characters are rather flat. I had a good time watching most of this movie, but I did find it, as I've found many of these movies over the last few months, predictable and without any real horror, even boring at times if I may be so bold. The terror, the horror, the fear... they kind of didn't exist in this movie. I found any kind of scariness literally lacking here, which was a disappointment on the interesting premise of this film. Again, most of these movies have great ideas, but they are simply executed poorly. Kakashi is better than most, but it still has the exact same flaws even if they aren't quite as apparent. One of the biggest flaws is that this manga story "Kakashi" or "Scarecrow" is a much better story than this film version to the point where I don't see why that unsettling idea was scrapped in favor of this story.

Kakashi is based off of Junji Ito's manga short story named the same as mentioned above. Ito also helped to write the screenplay of the film. The manga is quite a bit different, with the scarecrows being kind of an accidental thing after one is placed in a graveyard by a father to try and scare away a young man who was in love with his daughter who died. In the manga their sentience is also questionable at best and it is left open to the reader to decide whether they were "alive" at all or just projections put on to the scarecrows by the people who lost their loved ones. Overall the manga is a much better and more effective story, but is quite a bit shorter and with even flatter characters overall. Boy, oh boy... what I wouldn't give for a strongly characterized horror movie. It's bad when all of these movies have such archetypal and flat characters. I can't stand it. I can basically just predict what's going to happen and what characters are going to do. It's actually kind of boring. Horror movies should not be boring. That's really bad.

Anyway, the movie starts off with a girl, Kaoru, looking for her missing brother, Tsuyoshi. Kaoru is your standard quiet Japanese girl. She is quiet. I mean, REALLY QUIET. Almost unsettling so. She asks some questions and does eventually get a little pissed off, but is mostly ineffective and just too quiet throughout the film. I never could identify with her as a main character, never could say, "OH BOY, I LOVE SCENES WITH KAORU!" She was simply boring. Boring. Boring. And a little uninteresting to boot.

Anyway, it seems that another girl named Izumi has sent a letter to Tsuyoshi, telling him to come to her town to meet her. Okay, interesting premise, I guess. Tsuyoshi goes missing and Kaoru feels the need to look for her brother, which makes sense. The beginning of the film is actually effective. It has very little dialogue and relies on the atmosphere to tell the story. Kaoru goes through a tunnel to the out of the way town and her car breaks down, eventually leading her to the creepily quiet village and some strange people who all are carrying around scarecrows. She also sees a young woman who was thought to be missing named Sally, but the woman disappears before she gets a chance to talk with her.

Eventually Kaoru ends up talking to Izumi's parents, learning that there is something wrong with her. Izumi is an old classmate of Kaoru who seems to have had some sort of relationship or feelings for Tsuyoshi. The stilted dialogue between every character works at making the movie feel unsettling, but also works against this moving at slowing the pace down quite a bit. There is never really any intensity to the dialogue, and I honestly found myself nodding off a few times during the movie, which is never a good sign.

The way that Izumi's mother seems to detest Kaoru and Izumi's father seems sympathetic if a little gruff does work well, even if it seems like another standard trope. Izumi's father (played by Kenzô Kawarasaki), who seems to run the clinic, is easily the most sympathetic character in the movie and he is also quite probably the best actor here. Kaoru ends up staying a few night at Izumi's parents' house and has some pretty intense nights, either because of some pretty odd dreams or because her brother and Izumi are doing some pretty strange things at night. It's hard to tell what's fact and what's fantasy at this point in the film. A quotation that happens fairly often in the film is "Is this a dream? Or a fantasy?" and it really does pick up on the idea that the film and the town itself seem to take place somewhere outside of any reality. It's a pretty neat idea, but it's execution is a bit spotty.

Anyway, eventually we get into the meat and potatoes of the movie: the zombie scarecrows. Yeah, it's kind of silly, but also strangely effective in a boring and kind of average type of way. I'm reminded of other towns that are made up of weird people like The Shadow Over Innsmouth and "Children of the Corn." It's a worse story than either of those, but the sentiment is still there, which I appreciate. So, these zombie scarecrows try to stop Kaoru from leaving the town, but they're scarecrows. I mean, seriously? Nobody's thinking what I'm thinking? Scarecrows are not strong; they're made of straw and clothes. It's not like they have muscle or whatever. If you have a match, you are going to win. Hell, if you have a hand you'll win. It's a scarecrow. Made of straw. I'm pretty sure you can fight it off, Kaoru. But no, Kaoru is an idiot and seems to have trouble fighting off men made of straw. Sigh.

Then Kaoru finds herself in her car, trying to start it up to leave the zombie scarecrows forever, but... seriously... one of the zombie scarecrow evil townspeople things is the mechanic who worked on your car, Kaoru. Stop trying to start it up and run. The evil mechanic didn't fix your car. They all lied to you. He specifically lied to you. The policeman lied to you. Stop trying to start it and... finally you run. Jeez. It took you long enough, you crazy broad. So, then Sally becomes one of the main characters, and Kaoru seems to feel the need to save her as well. All right, all right. I get it. It's cool.

What isn't cool is reading someone's private diary. That's not cool at all, Kaoru. You have committed the grave sin of invading somebody else's privacy, and that's terrible. Anyway, I'm going to stop being silly. Kaoru finds and reads Izumi's diary and learns that Izumi had a HUGE thing for her brother, Tsuyoshi, but Kaoru already knew that and... well, she kept t from her brother, actively trying to shut down any romance before it could get started. That's not very nice Kaoru. That's really not cool at all. It seems that Kaoru wasn't a very good friend. Not helping Izumi... no, actively making sure that Izumi had no chance with her brother... eventually causes Izumi to go a little crazy, cursing Kaoru and in the end killing herself. Izumi pulls a perfect "all work and no play make jack a dull boy" type of thing in her diary with the repetition of Kaoru's name over and over again before you kills herself though. That's pretty cool, almost unsettling. That's one reference to a better horror film. Then there's another reference as Izumi speaks of the jealousy that Kaoru has for her relationship with Tsuyoshi. Izumi pulls the reference from Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) when Izumi opens her mouth and screams at Kaoru, exactly like what Donald Sutherland does in that movie. I rolled my eyes and was flabbergasted. It was a pretty blatant reference... both kind of were. And the rule of thumb is that you never reference a better movie in your film. Kakashi referenced at least two better movies.

So, the movie is moving along. The townspeople are reviving dead relatives through scarecrows. Izumi's restless spirit who is seeking revenge on Kaoru is kind of messing up the entire town though, causing a kind of dark energy to spread across it even into the zombie scarecrows. I like the idea of this, but it never really comes out after it's mentioned. I mean, yes, both of Izumi's parents are killed, but it's never really tense. It never feels as dark as it should. I think I might feel intimidated by some creepy zombie scarecrows, but it mostly feels kind of boring. They shamble a bit and there kind of is a chase... kind of... but really they're wasted... really, really wasted.

I will admit though that the best part of the movie is the ending. It gets kind of a little creepy maybe and stuff actually happens finally, which are always pluses in a horror movie. I like the way the scarecrow policeman gets up. That was pretty creepy, kind of unsettling to see a person move so unnaturally. Then... OH NO DIRT.... um, don't know where that came from... Oh boy, is this movie almost over? I kind of want it to be over... Again, the ending is good, but the movie is so slow and dull that I just want it to end already.

Eventually Kaoru finds her brother and grabs Sally. They all go off to leave the town but get sidetracked somehow to where the scarecrows are set to come back to life... conveniently. Izumi comes back to life and calls Tsuyoshi to her who uses a flare to burn them both up while they embrace. The burning effect is not well done, but sentiment was beautiful. I really liked it and thought it was pretty effective.

Eventually Sally and Kaoru run through the tunnel from the beginning of the movie, but Kaoru hears her brother calling her and decides to go back to the town as Sally escapes. It's a standard ending and kind of works, but I have questions and thoughts about this movie. And I shall list them.

1. What is Kaoru's relationship with her brother? It seems more than sisterly. Maybe it's just a Japanese thing, but seriously Kaoru seems either extra clinging or it seems like she may have an incestuous relationship, or at least incestuous feelings, for her brother. Maybe I'm wrong or reading too strongly into it, but it seems pretty apparent to me. It changes the dynamics of both characters if this were true, showing Tsuyoshi's coming to the town to be a way to get away from a sinful relationship with his sister, and Kaoru's pursuit of him to be basically showing that she is indeed the villain in this movie, not Izumi, who seems to be the biggest victim of all, a victim of Kaoru and her clingy ridiculous behavior. Now, even if there is nothing sexual or incestuously wrong with Kaoru's relationship with her brother, she's still wrong and terrible, basically refusing to live out her own life, giving it up rather easily just because her brother is that important to her. It's rather offensive to the senses.

2. I  like the living scarecrows, the shells that take in the dead souls. I think the original manga is much better put together, with the scarecrows accidentally taking on the faces of the dead and the souls never really coming back to life. It seems creepier that way, certainly more unsettling, and less explainable. I don't like the town with a dark secret type of thing, certainly not if it's supernatural like this movie was. The original manga just had more mystery and a better feeling to it. This film seemed really boring despite its short length. It just didn't have the power to be scary or effective or even really well done. It was an intensely mediocre film, one that I couldn't recommend to be watched even if it isn't necessarily an offensive or terrible film.

3. The tunnel seems to show a transition between life and death. I liked this idea quite a bit, but have seen it in other movies, most memorably in Spirited Away, where it was done SO much better. The transition between the living world and the world of the dead is a meaningful one and one that Kaoru just can't accept in the end, which I think is absolutely interesting, but really it's too little, too late for this film.. All of those people in the village cannot accept death and so live side-by-side with death, but once you leave the village, you leave death behind you as well. You move on, finding life instead of basking in death. It's what makes Sally's decision to leave such an important and strong-headed decision whereas Kaoru's decision to stay in the village is instead a weakness on her part. She's essentially a very needy, very weak character who has no choice but to look back when her brother calls, who has no choice to leave the land of the living because she doesn't have the strength to go on alone. You don't look back to death once you leave it behind you. You never look back. Orpheus taught us as much. Sodom and Gomorrah taught us as much. Salt, anyone? But Kaoru did look back, and of course it damned her. The ending might be the creepiest part, and the most thought-provoking as well. It certainly was a reference to those works and I thought it was very effective, even if it kind of destroyed Kaoru as the heroine and as a strong character... but she was never really strong, was she?

Kakashi is not a great movie. It has some moodiness to it and its atmosphere is well done for the most part, but it ultimately fails as a horror movie because it's never really scary. And it fails as a normal movie because it's never really all that interesting. It could have been a good zombie film, but it lacked the zombie bits. It could have been a good ghost revenge film, but the revenge really never comes. Kaoru both "wins" and "loses," but Izumi seems to basically cease to exist, thus never finding happiness with the, I assume, reborn Tsuyoshi, and never finding happiness in finding revenge against the girl she hated so much. It's a wishy-washy film, one that never really seems to do anything at all, and it ultimately fails because it could have been so much better if it had tried to be something definable, something scary or interesting. Instead it never really is anything at all.

Movie Appraisal: The Other Side of the Tracks (The Haunting of Amelia) (2008)

OH MY GOD. Oh wow. Oh wow. Oh wow. Okay, I started watching this movie on a freaking whim. I saw that it had been filmed partially in my own hometown and I just wanted to watch it and see if I recognized anything. I mean, I wasn't expecting to even freaking enjoy it. I mean, I figured that this was just a simple independent film that seemed like it didn't have a terrible story to it. So, I watched it. And now, after I've finished it, I'm sitting here with my jaw hanging wide open and not understanding the world anymore.

So, first of all, I bow my head and clap my hands to A. D. Calvo, the director, and the cast of characters of this movie, especially Brendan Fehr, Chad Lindberg, and Tania Raymonde, the main cast of characters. They were brilliant, absolutely brilliant and I didn't even really see it until the end of the movie. ARGH, this movie was so freaking good! I can't even stop and breathe for a second. Hell, I should be studying instead of writing about this, but I can't. This movie was just too good.

So, I'll get to a point-by-point review. It'snot every day that I get to watch a new film that is absolutely stunning. I think the last film of that caliber that I saw was Sauna: Wash Your Sins, but that film was also very different than this one.

At the heart of it, it's clearly an independent film. It feels like a film that could never even get into theaters despite being higher quality than anything mainstream right now. I mean, damn, this movie is going to stay with me for a long time. it gave me so much to think about, so much to wonder about. I just loved the entire feeling of the movie. I also didn't understand until the very end of the movie why many websites listed this as "fantasy," but now I do. It's fantasy in the classic sense, not the Lord of the Rings elves and dwarves sense. The movie is psychological and does have some scary elements to it, but it is never horrific. Warning, I am going to spoil the Hell out of this movie, so avoid reading past this point if you don't want them.

The story is essentially a cross between a romance/friendship movie and a psychological horror movie with fantasy elements revealed in the end. The acting is simply fantastic, but only after viewing the whole movie. Don't look at the first half of the movie and think that that is all there is. This movie drew me in and I loved it. I haven't felt this positive about a movie in a very long time.

The movie is comedic at times, partially due to Stephnie Weir from MadTV fame and Sam Robards being in this movie. They are absolutely fantastic and amusing. The dialogue can be incredibly awkward at times, and heavy-handed at other times, but in the end it is so full of misdirections and twists and turns out to be so much more genius after viewing the entire movie. Ink is a good comparison to this movie. Both are independent films that are utterly beautiful with amazing acting and stellar direction. Seriously, I am in awe here that I had never heard of this movie before. I will be looking out for more movies from A. D. Calvo. Mark my words, the man is fantastic.

There are energetic performances all over the place. The actors really seemed like they had a good time. There is a train motif that runs throughout the movie in the same way that lot of psychological horror movies usually have a hospital setting. This is so new and different and beautiful. Why can't all movies feel like this? It has a similar feeling to what Carnival of Souls should have felt like if it were ever to be done well.

Rusty Miller (Chad Lindberg) has a ragingly awesome car just to let you all know. His character and the character of Josh (Brendan Fehr) really are amazing together. This is the story between two old friends having a reunion and reconnection just as much as it is a love story. But  at first there is such a disconnect in the two main character's emotional and energetic performances. Josh shows the feelings of depression and obsession whereas Rusty is just so energetic, so willing to move and shake and roll with the punches. man, he's so cool.

A few questions should be raised here, even if they are ultimately not the main themes of the story in the end. There is the question of lasting love and does love last beyond life and death? Can a person forget about life after their lover dies? Can they refuse to ever move on by what happened? Will they just live in the past forever? I don't know. I guess I do know a little. I know statistics of how many people keep living after their forever love has died. So many just die from something like heartache... or heartbreak... maybe there's something in that. We need that love most of the time. We need that companionship. How can we be human without love? I don't even want to think about losing the person I love to a horrible accident. I couldn't even imagine it even if it does happen all the time. I have no idea how I would keep together and maybe that's part of the terror, the soul-quenching horror, maybe it's an ordinary fear, but it is one that hits me quite hard.

Josh, the depressive, perks up when Amelia (Tania Raymonde) shows up. He certainly turns on the charm with her moreso than he has with Rusty and the other characters, but I'll get back to that later. The chemistry between them is incredibly well done.She just gets the job at the pizza place that Josh works at without any kind of interview at all. That was kind of easy... actually... wow, that was the easiest interview ever. She comes onto Josh so heavy. Jeeheez, woman, I can see that you're interested in our boy Josh here. But she never overdoes it, not when the ending is known. I can understate that they have a ton of charisma with one another. I have to give them that.

Rusty, on the other hand, does not have any skills with women. Rusty is not Mr. Charming, but also that is a plot point I will get to later and a brilliant one at that. Man. And Josh acts towards the girl he likes and telling people about her about like I do, which I find funny. The dude's excited. Be happy, Joshy boy. I see hints all over the place that Amelia doesn't exist, possibly, but it's all freaking misdirection. Watch the magician's other hand, not the one that he flourishes so nicely. A. D. Calvo, you are a magician of a director.

So, from the beginning of the movie we've seen that Rusty and Amelia know each other and have something between them. She tells Josh to beware of Rusty, but the dude is the best character ever! Why would I beware that weird and awesome dude?

One thing I do have to admit, maybe it's just that I knew it would come, but there's a kissing frame before Josh and Amelia kiss. It's so freaking obvious they're going to kiss. LIPS ARE COLD HINT. We have to remember that. Ghost?

"Sometimes we need to let go, otherwise we remain haunted." The themes of this movie are all hitting me over the head here. Even if they are, they are kind of good morals: moving on, letting go... it works.

So, another thing is that there are parallel stories too and the smaller one makes no sense until the end unless you have the biggest notice of Chekhov's gun that there ever was. There are hints all over the place, but I didn't catch it. So, the subplot is about the owner of the pizza place, her daughter, and her daughter's lesbian lover who takes care of her mother's brother who is in a coma. Whew! Get all that? Anyway, they have some ideas about life and death and even love and they come out of nowhere at first and I was all like, surprise lesbians for no reason? And then the ending presented the reason and I was all like, that was brilliant.

I'm raving and ranting here by the way. This was a good movie.

Amelia's make-up and the music within the film are both absolutely fantastic, just pointing it out. I mean, they did a fantastic job and it was kind of cool to see. There is the only scare chord after "sex" scene. But there is also a blending between reality and dreams by this point even if Amelia's bracelet proves that it's all true. Pay attention to that freaking bracelet too. It appears all over the place.

OH DAYAMN a hickey! Josh has a hickey, that must mean that Amelia is real, right? The friendship scenes between Josh and Rusty are all kinds of sweet, really opening Josh up to the world and making him feel something and anything. It's certainly letting his character evolve and change throughout the story.

There are themes of leaving home, of the loss of stagnation, and of the evolution of a person. These are not as apparently head-hittingly obvious as they appear. They're actually quite subtle, less Blue Velvet and more Ink.

The sounds are fantastic as he runs from the very dead girl that was one Josh's Emily. He has a dream of his dream girl swathed in light. Amelia is another name for Emily. I'm going quickly because the movie moves like this. These are the things presented. Put the puzzle together, my readers.

Wake up and move on is what everybody keeps telling him, but Josh finally loses it. He can't leave, he doesn't have the power or the energy to leave and it's all because of the girl he once loved, and still loves despite the ten years between them. Choices and decisions for Josh and he makes the right one. He decides to go with Rusty and then... there's Amelia again, in his house, asking for him to go with her one last time. Oh, man it's really poignant, and then he's gone. not quite suicide, but close.

Rusty and Amelia were spirits sent to help Josh find his way, either to life or to death for he was the brother and the uncle in the coma. His girlfriend and his best friend were killed in the train accident and he survived in a coma. They came to help him in the ways they thought best. He could have woken up or simply kept going on as he was if he had gone with Rusty, but Amelia showed him to let go, that he still had her even in death.

And the last scene, between Emily and Rusty is fantastic, showing that Emily is ready to move on and be with Josh while Rusty still has work to do, still has to be that spirit guide with his awesome car. The Connecticut licence plate with "HEAVEN" on it made me feel ridiculously happy and I'm not even religious. I just loved those details and little touches. It was powerful and it worked really well.

Now, are there complaints? Yeah. The lesbians were not amazing actresses and it showed as they compared to the rest of the characters. I think it would have been more effective without the flashback scene too, but I see why it exists. I still didn't like it though and I thought it was a little hamfisted to a subtle movie like this. So, if I had one scene I would have taken out, it would be that simply because all of that was already established, or close to established, and I didn't see the need to reveal something we already kind of knew. The music also was a little too loud from time to time, but besides those, I thought this film was incredible.

Watch it. If you read my blog to hear about all the great psychological or horror movies out there, this is one of the most beautiful of them. I won't forget this one and I think everybody should be forced to see it. I compare this to Black Swan and all I see is the quality here and the lack of it there. This film makes me giddy whereas Black Swan makes me angry at the mainstream movies and their lack of focus, quality, or form. I can't believe a film like that could do well... oh, wait, yes I do... because people are stupid and can't see quality even after it stands up and kicks them in the face.

Anyway, seriously,this is a fantastic film. See it if you get that chance. I loved it and hopefully you will too.