Tag Archives: Witching and Bitching

EVIL Wants to Cut Out Your Unborn Child. “Inside” reviewed! (Second Sight / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Order The Limited Edition Copy of “Inside” From Second Sight!

Four months after deadly car crash that claimed the life of her husband, a disheartened and depressed Sarah is 24 hours away from being induced into labor on Christmas day.  Just wanting to be left alone, Sarah is eager to lower her head into her work as a photojournalist of capturing horrifying images that bear a resemblance to her own accident and inviting her editor over later to discuss the work ahead.  As the even lingers into night, an unexpected woman knocks at the door and menacingly tries to break into her house.  As the police arrive to investigate the incident, the woman is nowhere to be found and brush off the incident with little concern, but the woman returns, finds herself inside Sarah’s home, and is determined to cut the baby directly from Sarah’s womb to be her own child.  The tormenting violence becomes a cat-and-mouse game between the two women with an unborn child hanging in the balance. 

Extremely violent and soul biting, “Inside” is one of the more corrosively dehumanizing and destructive films under the French New Extremism, French New Wave Horror, flag.  The 2007 French feature cowritten-and-directed by Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury broke the duo into the industry as formidable and fearless filmmakers, reaching global heights having helmed later in their careers a segment of the popular anthology “ABCs of Death 2” and tackling one of America’s more renowned and bred-and-buttered horror franchises with the chainsaw-wielding cannibal in “Leatherface.”  “Inside” comes after the tremendous success of Alexandre Aja’s “Haute Tension,” opening the flood gates to other extreme French horror films in early 2000s with also “Martyrs” and “Frontier(s).”  La Fabrique de Films and BR Films in association with Canal+ server as production companies with later “Frontier(s)’s” Teddy Percherancier, Frederic Ovcaric, Rodolphe Guglielmi, and “Witching and Bitching’s” Franck Ribière and Vérane Frédiani producing the film known as “À l’intérieur” in France.

Not your typical home invasion ultraviolence, Sarah and who we know as labeled only as The Woman are two vipers circling each other, ready to strike when the guards are let down.  Of course, both have distinct personalities and strategies in the measured way of attack and survival that will impress on viewers preconceived notions about them.  As Sarah, Alysson Paradis, younger sister of Johnny Depp’s wife Vanessa Paradis, is bathed in exposed light, literally and figuratively, as the pinpointed principal woman from the start, battered and bloodied in the opening two car accident, to the end, in the final harrowing moments with the relentless Woman but though Paradis performance reeks greatly of depression and perhaps hopelessness with the death of her husband with a baby soon to be brought into this world without a companion by her side, the momentum shifts towards proposed surface villain of the story, The Woman, in a frightening portrayal of stony guile and grim severity by the established, character provocateur French actress Béatrice Dalle (“The Witches’ Sabbath”) in comparison to Paradis relatively filmic beginnings.  Dalle’s role expresses more physically than vocally with motivation coursing through her eyes, facial expressions, and body language that strikes a transfixing chord, turning Dalle’s the Woman into not only an unpredictable killer but an on-screen killer with a lighted purpose without confounding arbitrary slaughter as the yearning for The Woman’s reason never breaks silence until the shocking end.  François-Régis Marchasson, Nathalie Roussel, Ludovic Berthillot, Nicolas Duvauchelle, Aymen Saïdi, Emmanuel Lanzi, and Dominique Frot (“Among the Living”) fill out “Inside’s” cast.

Most will plainly see and interpret “Inside” as a regular home invasion thriller of a pregnant woman defending herself to survive a mad woman’s unborn baby obsession, and maybe that’s how Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury mostly intends the narrative to be as an overly graphic portrayal of hate and envy that makes us uncontrollable sinners at heart.  However, there’s something inside me to dig deeper below the face value of terrorizing prenatal torment of a young, expecting mother-to-be in what could be construed as a double-edged explanation.  The Woman doesn’t hold a name as she symbolizes all the worst qualities of a mother, such as anger, deceit, and she even smokes, in Sarah that could be considered a split persona or an archetype of duality.  Sarah is cladded in a bright white nightgown while The Woman is dressed all in black from head-to-toe, contrasting a good versus evil, and both want the same child.  The climax does rebuff the split duality theory to an extent but the way the script is written and how the film is shot very much suggest these two women are cleaved from the same whole with a patriarch-less presence and, to add as an interesting note to further examine and contemplate, all the male characters in the story are slain by the same women while the only other female character is brought down by the other in what is a powerful suggestion of split gender and how gender plays a role in their individual lives.

In what can be said to be the most definitive edition of one of the most brutal films ever produced, Second Sight Films’ Limited-Edition boxset of “Inside” is amply packed with goodies, in application and in a tangible sense. Presented in a widescreen 1.78:1 aspect ratio, the AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition, double-layered BD50 from the UK label holds tremendous value with not only new special features and neat and attractive corporeal contents but also valued by retaining image fidelity with a gritty 35mm print. Natural grain and low-fi celluloid present the seedy grindhouse overlay that’ll take audiences from the comfy, cozy reality into a dark, anomalous atmosphere with warm muted coloring, lambency, and an overall light general haze suffused into the setting. The cinematography has been purposefully constructed with analog building blocks for a rough look for a rough story. Not technically applicable here but “Inside” is set around Christmas, Christmas eve into Christmas day to be exact, but the choice production dressing exhibits little holiday spirit with a far less ostentation presentation and in how the characters dress the season feels more fall like than winter. The lossless French 5.1 DTS-HD master audio offers plenty of spatial awareness during intense pocket skirmishes inside the quaint two-story home, which is the primary setting of the story. The range provides laceration slits and surgical squishes of blades and scissors while gunfire shocks with an innate immediacy. Even with a mostly prominent inconversable back-and-forth, the dialogue that does come up carries through with robust confidence without overbearing the action or feeling out of synch. Speaking of being in synch, English subtitles are available with the French audio track and are error-free and pace well. Special features include a new audio commentary by The Final Girls’ and film critic Anna Bogutskaya, new audio commentary by editor Elena Lazic of the online magazine outlet Animus, a newly produced interview with writer-directors Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury First Born as well as newly produced interviews with principal actress Alysson Paradis Labour Pains, producer Franck Ribière A New Extreme, cinematographer Laurent Barès Womb Raider, and stunt coordinator Emmanuel Lanzi Reel Action, with The Birth of a Mother, a Jenn Adams analytical essay focusing on a denied mother’s perspective and the opposite. The limited-edition physical elements of the release add additional magic to the whole package with a rigid, cardboard sleeve case with new artwork by Second Sight retainer artist James Neal. Inside the “Inside” sleeve is a 70-page book with color pictures and thematic essays from film historians and critics Chad Collins, Kat Ellinger, Annie Rose Mahamet, and Hannah Strong. There are also 6-5×7 collector art cards adjacent. The green Blu-ray Amary case houses the same Neal front cover from the rigid sleeve, likely will be the face of the standard release, with the interior disc art having a simple yet effective image of a blade open pair of scissors and psycho-split or -sliced title in red and while. UK certified 18 for strong bloody violence and very strong language, this Second Sight release is B region locked and has a runtime of 83-minutes.

Last Rites: Second Sight invests in “Inside” and its first-time French directors nearly two decades after initial release with a comprehensive package that not only elevates beyond what many labels sought to get out of the gore-laden entropy, quick cash, but this premier release also has depth and range into the film’s applied style and dives into demystifying the breadth of thought preluding random terror.

Order The Limited Edition Copy of “Inside” From Second Sight!

Tune In to EVIL’s Frequency. “99.9” reviewed! (Cult Epics / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Lara, a paranormal radio show host, learns her close friend and former lover has been tragically killed in an accident at small village of Jimena.  Determined to find out what happened after a mysteriously mailed tape unveils disturbing images of her friend, Lara travels to Jimena to investigate the accident she believes was intentional.  Entangled amongst the village’s strange residents, suspicions are high on just about everyone who had contact with the deceased, but Lara is certain about one thing, at the center of her investigation is an abandoned house with a ghastly urban legend, afflicted by the entombment of murdered women and children souls and, one-by-one, the faces of the torture souls are manifestly etched out from within the walls onto the surface.  As Lara inches closer to the truth of her friend’s research of the phenomenon, the shocking truth will reveal a dark power trying to keep the house’s secrets contained.

Estranged lover.  Tortured souls.  Witchcraft.  Secret experiments.  Murder mystery.  Agustí Villaronga’s “99.9” depicts a loaded, shrouded ethereal thriller with a thin translucent layer of homosexuality draped over so delicately you almost don’t realize the Spanish filmmaker’s subtle exhibition of lifestyle exile.  The 1997 film, also known as “99.9:  The Frequency of Terror,” a subtitle moved from the main title to tagline status, is shot primarily in Madrid as well as certain exterior shots in La Vereda, Guadalajara to provide the intimate essence of a small village’s ever-watching glower.  Villaronga, along with cowriters Lourdes Iglesias and Jesús Regueira, stitch an argyle style narrative sweater of consistent checkered behavior inside an ostentatious presentation of simmering hostility toward foreigners and homosexuals, stirring an isolating heroine into a mixture of local animus and lingering occultism.   “The Black Moon” and “Ninth Gate” executive producer Antonio Cardenal solely funds “99.9” and with Impala and Origen Producciones Cinematograficas serving as co-productions. 

Bearing most of the story’s weight is lead actress María Barranco (“Witching and Bitching”) in an unfamiliar to her thriller role polar opposite of her profound previous work as a comedienne in the vocational genre.  Yet, Barranco grabs the role with undue hesitation or eager to professional please Villaronga with her character entering a spurning atmosphere seething with mistrust and ill-intent.  Playing a single mother enduring the unknown status of her estranged lover, also the father of her fatherless child, it isn’t until a package containing a VHS tape of mostly recorded static and a naked man, her estranged lover Victor (Gustavo Salmerón, “V/H/S Viral”), briefly seen fleeing for his life instills a strong uncompromising need to find the truth.  Barranco captures being rocked and shaken by Victor’s footage so much so that her tension and fear contagiously transmit to the viewer and that hardly lets up in a deluge of suspicious and dread curiousness compelling her to investigate the gruff and oddly civil villagers.  One of those village inhabitants, Juan Márquez, reeks of nervous energy that’s poured into his hunky local mechanic Mauri who becomes the mystery’s weakest link amongst the unbreakable locals, especially under the rigid impatience of Mauri’s girlfriend Julia (Ruth Gabriel), house owner Lázaro (Ángel de Andrés López, “Sexy Killer: You’ll Die for Her “), and the creepy committed bruha mother Dolores (Terele Pávez, “The Day of the Beast,” “Witching and Bitching”).  Pávez stamps her presence into “99.9’s” grim resolve that links Dolores to the souls trapped in the house with fanatical obsession.  The cast rounds out with Simón Andreu (“Flesh+Blood”), Pedro Mari Sánchez (“Creation of the Damned”), Maite Brik, and Paula Soldevila (“Immortal Sins”).

If I had to compare another film to “99.9’s” persistent bleak atmospherics and a singular principle quietly poking around to solve a cryptic scene-turner, a more widely known and recognizable title with a familiar cast, I would put up Villaronga’s film against Robert Zemeckis’s circa 2000 Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer thriller “What Lies Below.”  Both works are saturated with melancholy stuffing and are beautifully shot in their own stylistic right, but Villaronga adds an undercurrent of homosexual persecution as well as a xenophobic aspect that seeks to discourage, dismay, and disconcert nosy foreigners poking around in local business with a gray area of a big city versus little community vibe and scientific fact versus yokel superstition.  Yet, the script renders omission at more pivotal character junctures that go in-depth about backstory, such as the case with the forgotten Victor who, despite being a major plotpoint in the opening scene of the movie, is more a name thrown around as device to stir commotion amongst the locals.  Victor’s experiments in capturing the images and sounds of tortured souls aimlessly floating inside an ethereal plane in the electronic noise of television broadcast during his very much alive subjects’ REM sleep practically dissipates faster than a bottom burp with the window open and the breeze blowing. As loose as the script may be, Villaronga makes up for it with a tone of stern pall, a delicate theme of bigotry mitigated by the tortured souls and mischievous plot ingredients, and the timorous determination exuding from Maria Barranco’s portrayal.

“99.9” is Lara’s radio station frequency; a frequency in the story that nurtures and embraces the abnormal paranormal from callers night in, night out. Instead of sitting comfortably behind a mic and headphones, cozy in her sound proof studio, her frequency is a barrier that is flipped on it’s head as she becomes involved in like the stories of her callers. Speaking of flipping, in more of a “99.9” is Lara’s radio station frequency; a frequency in the story that nurtures and embraces the abnormal paranormal from callers night in, night out. Instead of sitting comfortably behind a mic and headphones, cozy in her sound proof studio, her frequency is a barrier that is flipped on it’s head as she becomes involved in like the stories of her callers. Speaking of flipping, in more of a layman, satanic sense, “99.9” inverted is also the sign of the beast. Either way, two solid possible metaphors for “99.9” give meaning to the tuning title that’s now available on a dual-layer Blu-ray and DVD combo from Cult Epics who present the film in the original European preferred widescreen 1.66:1 aspect ratio from a 2K scan of the original 35mm negative. Villaronga’s chromatic vision finds unadulterated success in the crisp, clean picture of the Cult Epics release with almost no damage from the original transfer. There’s a slight, and extremely brief, scratch noticeable in the first half of the film, but the amount of grain is perfection and no evidence of manipulation of enhancing. Details are insanely delicate on every tactile texture, even the skin. Aforesaid, Villaronga expresses in color, using a cool blue tints, which is actually toned down some with the transfer, and implementing different lighting techniques to reinforce Javier Aguirresarobe’s breathtaking scenic wide wide shot cinematography. The Spanish language DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 on the Blu-ray packs a punch with balanced channels funneling not only clean, unobstructed dialogue, but also “Pan’s Labyrinth” composer, Javier Navarrete,’s brooding baritone, chordophone score. There are two other audio options for the DVD: a LPCM 2.0 Stereo and a Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo. Optional English subtitles are available and do match up well with no faults. Special features include a new-ish interview with director Agusti Villaronga conducted by Cult Epic’s Nico B, the making of 99.9 that has archival interviews with the director, María Barranco, and other cast and crew, an isolated Javier Navarrete score, and Agusti Villaronga trailers. Both formats are region free and not rated with a runtime of 111 minutes. Back in the 90’s when Spanish supernatural thrillers peaked, “99.9” was right there with a captivating ghostly gossamer from Spain.

Own 99.9 on Blu-ray DVD Combine from Amazon.Com!