Halloween Horror Movie 31 for 31: We Are Legion. Day 7: Creep
Welcome to my annual 31 for 31! This year I’ll be watching 31 horror films submitted by people to me from various communication platforms. They can be good films, bad films, films you saw when you were 9 and maybe don’t hold up anymore, the sky is the limit unless its a space horror movie in which case the sky is not the limit.
This is a blind spot for me, or has been for a while, in terms of indie horror darlings you hear about all the time. I think since it was on the festival circuit I’ve been hearing about how great it is and I think like most micro budget indie things the more people build up your expectations the more its probably not going to hit as well for you. Not to say I didn’t like this, I just liked maybe half of this…mmm…3/4’s of this and considering its only 77 minutes long that means there is about 10 minutes of the movie I wasn’t super into which is not bad. If you’ve never heard of it, Creep is a found footage horror movie starring Mark Duplass and Patrick Brice, they also directed it, wrote it, produced it, costumed it, did the sets, about the only thing they didn’t do is edit it and I’m going to say they probably had a big hand in that but ACE wouldn’t let them take full credit. Be nice to your editors, they’re actually the ones who make movies work.
So when you’re talking about writing something you hear about ‘The Diamond’ a lot. Where you start at a point and then expand out to the wide middle where the story is totally open and go anywhere and then you have to converge back to a single point for the conclusion. And that’s what I am referring to when I said I liked the first half a lot, its so freaking interesting with the character it is setting up, I was totally hooked. You’re waiting for him to start doing serial killer stuff, you’re waiting for him to get more sinister and it just…really isn’t happening at least not on the pace you’d expect. He’s weird as all getout but because of the setup it can be justified to a degree. The shocking thing to me is when it gets more into the normal movie serial killer stuff is when I don’t like it as much, that 15 minutes is the weakest part of the film and then when you learn the truth of the situation that is when the work they did really pays off. Its that great twist thing where every action of the film is recontextualized in a different light that changes it dramatically. He goes from being a lonely strange man to a highly intelligent and sinister…creep.
From a technical standpoint there really isn’t much to talk about, I mean it is mostly a guy holding a camera and Mark Duplass talking to him. And then the second half is the camera guy talking to the camera, that would be Patrick Brice, while Mark occasionally appears in the background to be spooky. I don’t think there are any cgi or even practical effects shots in the movie, maybe the whiskey they drink is water, that’s about as advanced as anything gets. Even from that standpoint I wouldn’t say anything was innovative camera wise, its 2014, found footage is not exactly a new thing and on a zero dollar budget they’re not going to come up with anything new probably. But that’s fine, I wouldn’t be expecting that, the strength of this movie is not technical, it is writing and what is in front of the camera. A front on which it delivers because Duplass is such an interesting character actor and it really feels like a role he was meant for. He is a guy who can be charming but also a little deadpan and menacing in the same scene. He’s good looking but in a normal person way, that gives him the feel of someone you could see on the news while a neighbor says “He was always such a nice guy, I never suspected he could do that”. Which is exactly what this part is, he has to be disarming but also concerning simultaneously for the creepiness to work. Like “hey that was weird but eh we will get some pancakes and it’ll be okay”. If he looks like a movie star it doesn’t work, if he is too creepy it doesn’t work, he has to be sinister Jim from The Office. Basically it has the same quality as Anthony Perkins in Psycho where he just feels like an overly friendly guy at the grocery store asking why you’re buying 3 zucchinis at once and you almost pity him so you end up getting into way too long of a conversation. Its masterful, really and truly.
On the other side, a thing I really like about Patrick is he knows not to pull the trigger too early. Despite everything that happens we’re talking 5–10 minutes from the end of this movie before he actually starts getting scared. Before that he is mostly just annoyed like an older brother stuck babysitting their cousin who likes to jump out at them too often. And that’s great because that’s real, in real life you’d put up with this guy for one day for a thousand dollars, you absolutely would, you’d be annoyed, maybe even a little worried sometimes but you’d say “hey its one day, he seems nice but he’s just over zealous”. I want to give him credit because I don’t think Duplass works as well without this person to bounce off of, you have to hear it in Patricks voice that he is concerned but pushing through that to allow Duplass to continue pushing his character forward. Great stuff, its two very smart writers knowing how to play the part to make the writing work.
The plot is pretty basic, like most things with this movie on paper its not that impressive its only when you see it in motion that it really works. Patrick Brice plays Aaron, a struggling videographer who takes a job from a wanted ad, 1000 dollars for 1 day of work filming a guy at his home in the mountains. He drives up and meets, Duplass’ Josef, a man with an inoperable brain tumor who wants to make a video diary for his unborn son in case he never gets to meet him. And again to the movie’s credit it slowly burns it, it’s not like Duplass is immediately doing things that are creepy, to be frank he never does anything you’d consider too far until the very end. It’s weird requests, things that would make you uneasy but hey he’s a distraught father so you give him the benefit of the doubt. First he asks Aaron to film him in the bathtub because he may never get to wash his child. Then he wants to go on a hike to a secret spot in the woods, something he may never get to do. Then he wants to have his favorite pancakes, an experience he might not ever get to share. In all of those moments he does and says things that would give you pause but then provides a reasonable explanation. And it keeps playing chess with the audience, you know obviously he’s bad news but in Aaron’s situation you really couldn’t say why yet. Nightfall is where it starts to go further than I think most would allow as Josef wants to have a drink with Aaron and tells him a story about a thing he did and is ashamed of. Aaron then receives a concerning phone call and shortly after that the two part ways, this is where it shifts from Aaron’s movie as he becomes increasingly worried that Josef might have a Cable Guy-esq affection for him, that is to say he is being stalked and he’s not sure if its friendly, sexual or murderous, or all three. This is where I think it stumbles for 10 minutes or so as it tries to get a scare from you. Then we hit the last 5 and it picks right back up for the great finish where you understand what Josef was really doing all along.
It’s good, its better than good really, its not perfect and you know the result of the movie 2 minutes into the movie but I would say who cares? Don’t get obsessed with the idea of knowing how its going to end because the movie isn’t trying to hide that at all, its the journey of how you get there that is interesting. It’s learning about Josef even though you don’t really get any understanding of him, at least not that you can 100% believe as he’s a serial liar. Just come on in, sit down, have a 77 minute good experience and leave. You probably won’t think about it the next day but you’ll recommend it all the same.
