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Rating 2¾
Directed by Jaume Balagueró
Written by Jaume Balagueró and Jordi Galcerán
Starring Calista Flockhart (Amy Nicholls), Richard Roxburgh (Robert Marcus), Yasmin Murphy (Maggie), Gemma Jones (Mrs Folder), Elena Anaya (Helen Perez), Colin McFarlane (Roy), Michael Pennington (Marcus), Daniel Ortiz (Matt), Susie Trayling (Susan), Ivana Baquero (Mandy) and Karmeta Cervera (Charlotte)
Amy Nicholls starts work as the night nurse at Mercy Falls Hospital for Children on the Isle of Wight. The hospital is in the process of being closed down and only eight children remain, cared for on the first floor of the old crumbling building. One of the children, Maggie, who suffers from cystic fibrosis, tells Amy about Charlotte, a “mechanical girl” she communicates with using letter blocks. Strange things happen and Amy becomes convinced Charlotte is real and that the answer lies on the second floor, which has been sealed off and unused since 1959.
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This is the fifth film I have seen by the Catalonian director Jaume Balagueró, including one made for Spanish television, and although I would not claim he, as yet, by any stretch of the imagination, matches the best work of iconic American horror film directors like John Carpenter or Sam Raimi, I do really like what I have seen. In fact, if I think about it, I would have to consider Balagueró to be one of my favourite current film directors, although this is not something I had given much thought to up until now.
While watching the film I found myself thinking about ‘Don’t Look Now’, the cult 1973 horror film directed by Nicolas Roeg. The two films are not really similar, but there was something about ‘Fragile’ that reminded me of the earlier film and I couldn’t help but wonder if the horror genre will ever scale those heights again. Having said that, it is many years since I last watched ‘Don’t Look Now’ and perhaps I simply recall it through rose-coloured glasses. It is a film I must make a point of watching again sometime soon, both because it made a huge impact on me the first time I watched it and also to find out if it really is as good as I remember it being.
I enjoyed ‘Fragile’ very much. It follows the pattern of the other Jaume Balagueró films I have seen. His filmmaking style bears greater resemblance J-Horror than it does to, for example, the ‘Saw’ or ‘Hostel’ films. He does have an aptitude for building up a convincing level of unease and creepiness and that is particularly well captured here. He also has a penchant for using old Gothic buildings as a backdrop for his films. The setting, the tiny Isle of Wight, which is located just a few miles off the south coast of the English mainland, is a good one, although I suspect the film was actually made largely in the Catalan area of Spain.
The plot is quite simple and, as might be expected, the film covers well worn ground. The story takes place in winter time and the rainy setting does help to evoke a sense of isolation and melancholia, which benefits the narrative. One thing I did notice that pulled me straight out of the film was that up on the second floor of the hospital, which had supposedly been sealed off and unused for more than forty years, there were modern light switches. It was just a passing observation, but for some reason I could not put it out of my head and then found myself actually looking for other inconsistencies.
‘Fragile’ has a box office gross a little under $6.7 million. It does not seem to have been given a theatrical release in the UK or US.
Review posted 29 August 2009
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Rating 3
Directed by Jaume Balagueró
Written by Jaume Balagueró, based on the novel by Ramsey Campbell
Starring Emma Vilarasau (Claudia Horts de Gifford), Karra Elejalde (Bruno Massera), Tristán Ulloa (Quiroga), Carlos Lasarte (Santini), Toni Sevilla (Franco), Brendan Price (Marc Gifford), Jordi Dauder (Forense), Pep Tosar (Toni), Isabel Ampudia (Secretaria), Susana García Díez (Chica Piscina), Carmen Capdet (Monja), Jessica Del Pozo (Ángela) and Judith Tort (Ángela, aged five)
The badly mutilated body of a six year old girl is discovered and is identified as Ángela, the daughter of Claudia and Marc Gifford, who had been reported missing previously. Many years later, Claudia and Marc’s marriage having long since broken down, Claudia receives a mystifying telephone call from someone claiming to be her daughter. She contacts Bruno Massera, the police detective who originally investigated the case. He has just resigned from the police force and is initially sceptical of her claims, but after a strange video tape is sent to Quiroga, a young journalist on a trashy magazine, his unofficial investigations uncover evidence of a secret society dedicated to the search for evil in its purest form.
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‘The Nameless’ (‘Los sin nombre’, or ‘Els sense nom’, to give the film its Catalonian title) is a 1999 horror film directed by Jaume Balagueró, whose other films include ‘Darkness’, which stars Anna Paquin in a pre-‘True Blood’ role, and the critically well received ‘[REC]’. Balagueró also wrote the screenplay, which is based on a 1981 novel by the celebrated English horror fiction author Ramsey Campbell, whose work has been compared to that of H P Lovecraft.
A large portion of the early part of the film plays like a downbeat study of one woman’s consuming melancholia and the impact of losing her young daughter in such horrific circumstances, but as the film continues it turns into a kind of gothic horror study of the worship of evil, almost in style of old Hammer Horror films like ‘The Devil Rides Out’. The premise bears comparison to Balagueró’s own ‘Darkness’ and one notable scene is clearly modelled on ‘Silence of the Lambs’. Clichés abound, but the film also manages to be creepy and establishes a genuine sense of paranoia.
I have now watched several films made by Jaume Balagueró and although I would say they tend to be flawed, they are never less than interesting and this is perhaps the best film of his I have seen to date.
Review posted 7 August 2009
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Rating 3¾
Directed by Jaume Balagueró and Paca Plaza
Written by Jaume Balagueró, Luis Berdejo and Paco Plaza
Starring Manuela Velasco, Pablo Rosso, Ferran Terraza, David Vert, Jorge Yamam Serrano, Vicente Gil, Martha Carbonell, Carlos Vicente. María Teresa Ortega, Manuel Bronchud, Akemi Goto, Chen Min Kao, Daniel Trinh, Maria Lanau, Claudia (Silva) Font and Ben Temple
Ángela Vidal (Manuela Velasco), a young television reporter, is filming a documentary at a Barcelona fire station with her cameraman, Pablo (Pablo Rosso). A call comes in during the early hours of the morning and a unit is dispatched to respond to a report that an old woman has become trapped in her apartment. When they arrive on the scene and break down the apartment door, they discover that the woman is in a state of extreme violent distress, viciously attacking one of the fire crew. They then find themselves quarantined without expanation and locked inside the building, along with the handful of residents. It is then that the full horror of what they have stumbled upon slowly begins to unfold.
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‘[REC]’ is a Spanish horror film, co-written and directed by Jaume Balagueró, whose previous work includes the flawed but interesting and worthwhile English-language horror film ‘Darkness’, starring Anna Paquin, and ‘Para entrar a vivir’, part of the excellent 2006 ‘Peliculas para no dormir’ series of Spanish made-for-television films (‘6 Films To Keep You Awake’). Everything in the film is seen through the lens of the hand-held camera operated by Pablo and is, effectively, shot to create the effect that it is the documentary film footage. The two most immediately obvious points of comparison here are ‘The Blair Witch Project’ and ‘Cloverfield’ (I have not as yet seen the latter). Another film that quickly came to my mind is ‘The Mist’.
The sense of growing hysteria, fear and claustrophobia is extremely well done and the acting is excellent. Manuela Velasco, in particular, is very impressive, but the same is true of all the actors. I did, in truth, eventually find the film verging on being slightly tedious; I was worn down a little bit from watching people, covered in more and more blood, constantly screaming and running up and down flights of stairs through a shaky camera lens. However, clocking in at just 75 minutes, it does not outstay its welcome and is successful in everything it sets out to achieve.
‘[REC]’ has a 94% fresh rating at Rotten Tomatoes from 18 reviews. An American remake, ‘Quarantine’, starring Jennifer Carpenter, was released in October 2008.
Review posted 28 February 2009
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Rating 3
Directed by Jaume Balagueró
Written by Jaume Balagueró and Alberto Marini
Starring Macarena Gómez, Adrià Collado, Nuria González, Ruth Díaz and Roberto Romero
A young couple expecting a child go to see an affordable apartment situated in a dilapidated building in an outlying district of the city where they live. Once there, they find themselves trapped in a nightmarish and deadly scenario from which there seems to be no escape.
‘Películas para no dormir: Para entrar a vivir’ translates as ‘Films To Keep You Awake: To Let’. Made in 2006, this was one of six Spanish films based on a celebrated television series called ‘Historias para no dormir’ (‘Tales To Keep You Awake’), which was broadcast between 1966 and 1968 and briefly revived in 1982.
‘To Let’ is effective and excellently acted and bears some similarities to the Japanese horror film ‘Honogurai mizu no soko kara’ (‘Dark Water’). Although the stories told in these two films are actually quite different, the settings are similar. The story here is, perhaps, a little overstretched and, as such, ends up being rather threadbare. The set-up and the opening scenes are excellent, but once Clara (Macarena Gómez) and Mario (Adrià Collado) become trapped in the old apartment building it does start to get rather drawn out, although a decent level of suspense is maintained. The film only has a running time of 68 minutes, but I cannot help but think it would have been possible to trim 10 or 15 minutes from this. Having said that, I think it is well worth a recommendation.
Director Jaume Balagueró, who has won no fewer than 27 awards at various European film festivals, also directed ‘Darkness’, a horror film set in the Catalan region of Spain and starring Anna Paquin.…
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Rating 3
Directed by Jaume Balagueró
Written by Jaume Balagueró and Fernando de Felipe, with additional dialogue by Miguel Tejada-Flores
Starring Anna Paquin, Lena Olin, Iain Glen, Giancarlo Giannini, Fele Martínez, Fermí Reixach and Stephen Enquist
For those who do not already know this, I should start my review by saying I like horror films and I am particularly fond of haunted house stories.
An American family move into an architecturally unusual and dilapidated house situated on the outskirts of an unnamed city in Spain. The house, which was built forty years earlier, but appears to be much older, has apparently never previously been inhabited.
The father Mark (Iain Glen) previously suffered from a disease related to Huntington’s, although this was successfully treated with medication and he now longer displays symptoms of the illness. He spends his time aimlessly working on the house. Maria (Lena Olin) has a job in the city that often requires her to work late, but there is never any actual mention of what it is she does. Their slightly sullen teenage daughter Regina (Academy Award winner Anna Paquin, who is top billed here) seems to be beyond high school age and her only apparent activity is swimming lesions, which is where she meets Carlos (Fele Martínez). The youngest child is Paul (Stephen Enquist).
Mark had been brought up in this Spanish city until the age of seven, when his parents separated and his mother took him to America. His father Albert Riu (Giancarlo Giannini) still lives in the city and is a respected doctor at the local hospital.
Regina claims to feel a strange and troubling aura in the house. She becomes increasingly concerned when her father begins to exhibit symptoms of his illness again and she spots bruising on Paul’s neck. She tries to talk to her mother, who refuses to listen to her and dismisses her fears out of hand. She then turns to Carlos, telling him she was terrified of her father before his treatment. Mark is prescribed new medication by Albert Riu, who also talks to Paul and concludes there is nothing to worry about. However, the unexplained events in the house continue and become increasingly strange and scary.
The story continues in this vein until reaching a climax that seems to draw on a hotchpotch of ancient superstitions from various religions about the nature of darkness and Hell.
‘Darkness’ was a joint American/Spanish production, filmed in the Cataluña region of Spain. It has an international cast. Anna Paquin was born in Canada and raised in New Zealand. Lena Olin is Swedish, Iain Glen is Scottish and Stephen Enquist was born in Singapore. Giancarlo Giannini is Italian. The film premiered in Spain in October 2002 and was released into cinemas around Europe during 2002 and 2003. However, its American release was delayed until the end of 2004 and it was not released in Britain until 2005. It was greeted with very poor reviews. Rotten Tomatoes collects 50 together, resulting in a dismal 4% rotten rating.
The film is rather unfocused and incoherent. I particularly found the behaviour of Maria mystifying throughout. She would certainly get my vote as the most negligent parent I have ever come across in a film. She exhibits a complete lack of interest in her children and almost total apathy towards the very obvious mental decline of her husband. Her response to the bruising on Paul’s neck is to dismiss it as of no concern and when Regina attempts to share her fears she suggests her daughter pack her bags and sling her hook.
I could not make up my mind about the acting, although I do like Anna Paquin very much. There were times when the actors did not seem too clear themselves about what they were doing. Whether this is the result of the problems of language barriers working with a Spanish director I do not know. However, what this does is increase the sense of the curious dysfunctional inability to communicate that smoothers the family, so in some strange way it is almost to the benefit of the story.
‘Darkness’ shares a similar feel with Japanese horror films and I was particularly put in mind of ‘The Grudge 2’, Takashi Shimizu’s joint Japanese/American film from 2006. Like that film, I would hesitate to recommend ‘Darkness’, but for all of its very obvious faults, I did enjoy it very much and plan to watch it again at some point.
Miguel Tajada-Flores, who contributed additional dialogue to the screenplay, would later write the very silly ‘Decoys 2: Alien Seduction’.
Screencaps taken from anna-paquin.net
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Amy Nicholls starts work as the night nurse at Mercy Falls Hospital for Children on the Isle of Wight. The hospital is in the process of being closed down and only eight children remain, cared for on the first floor of the old crumbling building. One of the children, Maggie, who suffers from cystic fibrosis, tells Amy about Charlotte, a “mechanical girl” she communicates with using letter blocks. Strange things happen and Amy becomes convinced Charlotte is real and that the answer lies on the second floor, which has been sealed off and unused since 1959.
While watching the film I found myself thinking about ‘Don’t Look Now’, the cult 1973 horror film directed by Nicolas Roeg. The two films are not really similar, but there was something about ‘Fragile’ that reminded me of the earlier film and I couldn’t help but wonder if the horror genre will ever scale those heights again. Having said that, it is many years since I last watched ‘Don’t Look Now’ and perhaps I simply recall it through rose-coloured glasses. It is a film I must make a point of watching again sometime soon, both because it made a huge impact on me the first time I watched it and also to find out if it really is as good as I remember it being.
The plot is quite simple and, as might be expected, the film covers well worn ground. The story takes place in winter time and the rainy setting does help to evoke a sense of isolation and melancholia, which benefits the narrative. One thing I did notice that pulled me straight out of the film was that up on the second floor of the hospital, which had supposedly been sealed off and unused for more than forty years, there were modern light switches. It was just a passing observation, but for some reason I could not put it out of my head and then found myself actually looking for other inconsistencies.
