The Friday Night Horror Movie: Infinity Pool (2022)

infinity pool poster

David Cronenberg is one of the most interesting directors of the last few decades. He began by making low-budget body horror flicks (a genre that he essentially invented) and grew into one of the more intellectually stimulating horror directors ever with occasional stints into science fiction, crime, and straight dramas.

His son, Brandon has recently started directing films and so far he hasn’t strayed far from his father’s roots.

Possessor from 2020 was a film about an assassin who is able to take control of people’s bodies with some kind of brain implant technology. I quite liked it.

Infinity Pool is weirder and far less interesting.

James (Alexander Skarsgård), a failed writer looking for inspiration, and Em (Cleopatra Coleman) the rich daughter of a book publishing mogul take a holiday at a resort in a vaguely Asian, and apparently backward and rather hostile country.

They are not supposed to leave the gated resort, but when they meet Gabi (Mia Goth) and Alban (Jalil Lespert) they are talked into sneaking off to a beach for a bit of fun and drinking.

I don’t know how to talk about this film without spoiling some of its central concepts so be warned.

On their way back James, driving a bit drunk, hits a local man killing him instantly. The next morning he is arrested and told this country has very strict punishments, but a rather unique way out of it. For the killing, he is to be executed, but if he can pay a large fee they will clone him and it is the clone that will be killed.

He does just this and is forced to watch the son of the man he killed take a knife and stab his clone to death.

That night Gabi and Alban introduce James to a group of people who have all been through the same ordeal. But rather than be devastated over this, they have found it freeing. Here is a country that will literally let them get away with murder, as long as they can pay the fine. Having to watch their clones get executed afterward is just a bizarre perk.

The film has a lot to say about nepotism (which is really interesting since Brandon is a nepo baby) and how the rich can get away with anything. Both Goth and Skarsgård give really good performances. But it all left me wanting for more, or at least something different. It is an unsettling film, I felt very uncomfortable while watching it, but I couldn’t exactly pinpoint why.

Some films give you a feeling of dread – they make you feel like something terrible is going to happen to their characters and you dread the moment it comes. This had that same feeling, but all of the characters in Infinity Pool are terrible people, I was kind of hoping the bottom would fall out.

Cronenberg disorients us on several occasions. It begins with idyllic scenes of the resort with his camera turning upside down, making you feel a little seasick. There are several drug-induced hallucinations where he quickly cuts a lot of different images, many of which are flooded with psychedelic lighting that did nothing to help the film but did make me dizzy.

In the end, it felt like a film with some interesting ideas, some good performances, but the messy filmmaking dropped it all on the floor.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: Countess Dracula (1971)

countess dracula

I don’t remember the first time I became aware of Hammer Horror. They seem to be a part of my forever memory, but I suspect I actually came to know them rather late. Presumably, I heard some chatter about Hammer Horror after I became a fan of the Univeral Monster Movies, which would put it sometime after college. But it was years later that I actually watched any of their films. Letterboxd notes the first Hammer film I ever watched was Dracula (1958) in February of 2014. I watched The Curse of Frankenstein (1957) not long after that, but it wasn’t until 2020 that I watched a third film and from there I started watching Hammer Horror with some regularity.

What I’ve come to realize is that I tend to find Hammer films to be rather dull. Their stories often have a staid quality about them. Oh, eventually there is some bloodletting, some murders, maybe a monster or two, and a bit of horror. But they often (not always) take their time getting there. They tend to be very British in their melodrama. There are a lot of costumes, and talking, and ideas of decorum before the horror begins, and even then it always comes back to the drama.

But the thing is, I still kind of love these films. They are gorgeous to look at. The set designs – mostly creaky old castles, and magnificent gothic mansions – are impeccable. Their cinematographers are genius, filling each scene with color and shadows, fog and light. And those costumes, my goodness those costumes are simply fabulous. So, while I am sometimes a little bored with the stories, I never grow tired of just watching these films.

Despite its title, Countess Dracula has nothing to do with the Dracula legend, (and Christopher Lee and Peter Cushing are nowhere to be found) but is a loose retelling of the Countess Báthory story. She was a real person who lived in the late 1500s, was accused of killing hundreds of young women (and of bathing in their blood). Her story influenced a great many of the Dracula stories over the years so in that way you can consider this film a Dracula movie.

Anyway, in this story Countess Elisabeth Nádasdy (Ingrid Pitt, sadly dubbed for some dumb reason) discovers that drinking the blood of young women will restore her to youth and beauty. She does so and then must pretend to be her own daughter so as not to cause a stir in the village.

The real daughter, Ilona (Leslie-Anne Dow) was sent away when she was very young. When she returns to the castle, Elisabeth has her kidnapped and held captive so as to not be found out.

Meanwhile, Elisabeth seduces a young Lieutenant (Sandor Elès) all the while continuing to murder young maidens from the village (after killing a prostitute and bathing in her blood she realizes for the magic to work they must be virgins). In case you are wondering, all of the main servants in the household seem perfectly okay with their mistress regularly murdering people.

Eventually, things come to a head, but it takes its time to get there. I think I’ve made the plot sound much more exciting than it actually is. There is a lot more romancing than I’ve let on, and palace intrigue. There are a lot of scenes of people sitting around talking, and far too little bathing in blood.

But again, I still kind of loved it. I’m a big fan of Ingrid Pitt. She’s a marvelous horror icon and despite the painful voice dubbing she does some good work here. The sets are fantastic and the lighting is superb. There is a scene where Elisabeth is despairing over once again turning into an old hag. She wanders around her fabulously large, and perfectly lit bedroom in a flowing white gown and it’s like a dream.

The Friday Night Horror Movies: The Purge: Anarchy (2014) & The Purge: Election Year (2016)

the purge

I’ve watched several old British films for my Friday Night Horror the last few weeks so I wanted to watch something more modern and the first two Purge sequels fit the bill.

So, The Purge Franchise is set in a dystopian future. At some point in the past America was overrun with crime and violence. To curb this violence it was decided that one night a year, for a 12-hour period all crime, including murder, will be made legal. The thought is that this will allow everyone to get it out of their system, and for the rest of the year everyone will be chill.

Though the films lean on the idea that we aren’t all that far off from something like that actually happening, the concept is actually completely ridiculous. For real life I mean. For a movie, it’s really pretty cool.

The first film, simply titled The Purge (2013) focused on one (rich, white) family trying to survive the night. Things get complicated when they allow a stranger into their home and give him protection and a group of crazies come to say he is the very person they want to Purge. It isn’t a bad little thriller but it tends to lose focus on its conceptual idea and winds up focusing on the more generic base under siege aspects of the story.

I had minor hopes the sequels would spend more time on the bigger ideas. They sort-of do. While The Purge focused on one family inside their house The Purge: Anarchy and The Purge: Election Year expand the stories to larger groups of people and allow us to see more of the outside world.

The problem with all three of these films is that they all have a vague political message that boils down to The Purge is run by rich white people who benefit from the violence, while poor people of color suffer the most. A relevant message, but not one they hit on very hard, nor make very specific.

A concept like The Purge could make for a really great science fiction film with all sorts of allegories, but these films want to be money-making franchise machines in the horror genre and they don’t seem to have the stomach for more direct political messaging.

Yet they rarely nail the thriller/horror aspects either. If you are going to make a horror film about a period of time in which all crime is legal, then you should really go all in. Give us some Tobe Hooper-style insanity.

There is one really great scene during The Purge: Election Year that nails what I’m talking about. A car decked out in Christmas lights pulls up to a locked-up and barricaded convenience store. A group of women dressed in sexy Halloween costumes and carrying swords, saws, and machine guns get out and demand they be let inside, for the leader of the gang wants a candy bar. The subsequent battle is just as nuts. It is a well-staged sequence and it totally worked for me because it leans into the absolute insanity of the concept. The rest of the film doesn’t work nearly as well.

Thus far, the films have only had one character carry over from one film to the other. In The Purge: Anarchy we find Leo Barnes (Frank Grillo) on a mission to seek out some revenge on Purge Night. Along the way, he stumbles on several people who are clearly out of their depth and need help. By the film’s end, he’s become a reluctant hero.

In The Purge: Election Year he’s become head of security for Senator Charlie Roan (Elizabeth Mitchell) who is running for President on a ticket that promises to outlaw The Purge. Honestly, he’s kind of a generic action hero which is kind of my problem with the whole franchise thus far. My problem with most of the Blumhouse films I’ve seen, to be honest. They lack a specificity that can turn a high concept like this one into something great. Movies need a particular point of view, they need to find interesting ways to tell their stories. Otherwise, they wind up feeling generic, and just like a million other films.

These three The Purge films lack that specificity, that point of view. They take an interesting idea and turn it into something just average. That doesn’t make them bad films. I mostly enjoyed watching them. But it keeps them from being truly great or interesting.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: Island of Terror (1966)

island of terror

On a remote island off the coast of Ireland, a man is found dead with his bones missing. He’s all squishy flesh. The film’s budget doesn’t allow us to see much of that but what we get – a rubbery, flabby face – is pretty great. Constable John (Sam Kydd) calls the island’s physician Dr. Reginald Landers (Eddie Byrne) but his skills are limited and after an autopsy doesn’t pull up much in terms of answers he scurries to London to discuss the matter with imminent pathologist Dr. Brian Stanley (Peter Cushing), who in turn calls on bone specialist Dr. David West (Edward Judd). He’s busy with his lady friend Toni Merrill (Carole Gray) who as luck would have it happens to have access to a helicopter that can take them to the island straight away (although it must return to London immediately after thus stranding them on the island for a few days.

After learning that a cancer specialist had set up shop on the island they go to visit him hoping to gain his help as well, but find him dead and boneless like the other guy. His lab assistants are all squishy as well. But the dude had a really nice lab which allows our heroes to do some nice science-y stuff. They do some autopsies and look at things under a microscope and say a lot of words that don’t make much sense even if you have a medical degree.

Eventually, they find the monsters. They look like slimy Jell-O molds with tentacles. They are impossible to kill and use the tentacle to inject their victims with bone-dissolving liquid. Our guys chop them with an axe, shoot them with rifles, torch them with Molotov cocktails, and even throw dynamite at them, but like I say those creatures are indestructible.

To keep the rest of the islanders safe they lock them all into one room which only causes mass panic when the lights go out. Meanwhile, these brilliant scientists finally decide that they should inject some cows with some radioactive fluid (I told you that the cancer guy had a well-stocked lab) figuring that the monster will eat the cows and then die of radioactive poisoning.

All of this is taken absolutely seriously by our actors and filmmakers. I love these old British horror films from the 1960s. They are so full of absolute silliness with ridiculous plots and poorly built monsters, but the actors perform like they are doing Shakespeare (and no doubt many of them are trained Shakespearean actors). It is wonderful. Just wonderful.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: The Innocents (1961)

The Innocents

Based upon The Turn of the Screw by Henry James The Innocents stars Deborah Kerr as Miss Giddens a young woman who takes her first job as a governess for two children at a large country estate.

At first, things seem absolutely perfect. The estate is wonderful, the house is beautiful and there are lovely gardens and a pretty little lake that you can take a rowboat out on. Mrs. Grose (Megs Jenkins) the housekeeper is kindly and the children – Miles (Martin Stephens) and Flora (Pamela Franklin) are adorable.

She actually doesn’t meet Miles at first for he is away at school but Flora seems like an angel. They get along marvelously. Flora keeps saying that Miles will return home soon, but that can’t be correct for the term has just started. When he does arrive shortly thereafter – expelled from school – we know strange things are afoot.

Miss Giddens never seems to sleep well, she tosses and groans all night. She hears whispers echoing through the house. She sees visions of a man and a woman wandering about the grounds. When she describes them to Mrs. Grose she finds they look just like the former governess and groundskeeper both of whom died at the estate.

I won’t spoil where it goes from there, but it does go to some very interesting places. But what makes The Innocents so wonderful isn’t just the story but the filmmaking. It is shot in beautiful black and white that often uses a deep focus allowing people and objects in both the foreground and background to remain sharp. Director Jack Clayton uses this to great effect often placing a character very close to the camera while allowing someone much farther back to react.

It makes great use of light and shadow. The house is both enormous and claustrophobic, enchanting and terrifying. It has some of the best sound design I’ve ever heard in a movie. The musical score consists mostly of a hauntingly beautiful little melody that is played over and over, and sometimes sung and hummed by the children. The house is full of strange noises. There are footsteps and whisperings, creaks, and insects buzzing, and the constant howling of the wind. I’d love to see this film in a large theater with a great surround sound system for I know these noises would come from everywhere to great effect.

It isn’t a particularly scary film, but it is full of dread and a sinister mood. There is a lot of bubbling beneath the surface of the film. Miss Giddens comes from a small home in the country. Her father is a minister and she’s been quite sheltered. When she learns about the former governess having an affair with the groundskeeper she is quite shaken. When she finds out it was the children who caught them in the act she is completely shocked.

Quite a few people have pointed out that her visions of ghosts and her fear that the children are being possessed and need to be protected at all costs come from her own repressed sexuality.

I’m not smart enough for all of that, but I can say there is a lot to come away with and unpack.

This was a wonderful way to start my Great British Cinema month.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: The Stuff (1985)

the stuff

Late at night, in a snow-covered quarry, a man comes across a bubbling puddle of white goo seeping out of the ground. “What is this?” he asks himself and then proceeds to eat it. Yummy.

Thus begins The Stuff a very silly, messy, and deeply weird movie from the warped mind of writer/director Larry Cohen.

The Stuff, as the white goo is called is packaged and sold as a low-calorie, completely organic ice cream substitute. It has become incredibly popular, so popular in fact that the big ice cream companies have become nervous. They hire former FBI agent turned industrial saboteur David “Mo” Rutherford (Michael Moriarty) to spy on The Stuff Company and figure out exactly what’s in it so they can start making the stuff themselves.

He teams up with Chocolate Chip Charlie (Garrett Morris) a junk food mogul, Nicole (Andrea Marcovicci) an advertising exec who helped sell The Stuff to the masses before she realized exactly what it is, and eventually a young boy named Jason (Scott Bloom) who sees The Stuff independently moving inside his refrigerator and takes it upon himself to start smashing the stuff in a grocery store.

Together they come to realize that The Stuff is a living organism that turns humans into zombie-like creatures before completely consuming them. They’ve got to find out where The Stuff is coming from and find a way to destroy it before it destroys humanity.

I’m making that plot sound more coherent than it actually is. So much of what happens doesn’t make any kind of sense. The plot jumps around from place to place, event to event without any connective tissue allowing our heroes to take leaps that they couldn’t logically make. It’s really pretty ridiculous.

But it works. Mostly because of Michael Moriarity’s completely odd and off-kilter performance and the wonderful production design. There is a great mix of miniatures, puppets, and back projection to make The Stuff look menacing (it never actually does look menacing – it is about as scary as The Blob and just as fun).

The cast includes Danny Aiello as an FDA official who is terrified of his dog for some reason, and Paul Sorvino as an ultra-conservative and totally nuts military Colonel.

The Stuff isn’t a good movie by any stretch but it makes for a wonderful Friday Night Horror movie if you’re in the mood for a totally mid-1980s bit of silliness.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: Grabbers (2012)

grabbers

Grabbers is a horror comedy about a bunch of squid-like Alien face-huggers that land off the coast of an Irish island. They live off of water and blood but seem to be allergic to alcohol. To survive the townsfolk must stay as drunk as possible as that makes their blood poisonous to the creatures. That’s a great premise. One the film struggles to live up to. It is a throwback to those old 1950s science fiction films like The Blob (1958) or The Giant Claw (1957). It takes its monsters seriously while also winking at the audience.

Garda Lisa Nolan (Ruth Bradley) volunteers her time on the remote island to allow the chief a couple of weeks off. She’s a workaholic and initially takes offense to Garda Ciarán O’Shea (Richard Coyle) who comes to work half-drunk all the time. But mostly she figures it will be a quiet stay and will impress her bosses for working on her vacation time. When some mutilated whale corpses wash up on the shore she gets a little worried, but Dr. Smith (Russell Tovey) a marine ecologist assures her that while unusual such things are not unheard of.

Then the aliens attack.

Well, first the town drunk, Paddy (Lalor Roddy) captures a small “grabber” and our heroes all have a good look at it. When it lays some eggs they realize it is a female and figure there must be a male version somewhere on the island. He’s the big one and soon enough he’s attacking everybody.

Eventually, they realize the whole blood alcohol thing and then they hustle the town into the local pub and have a big drunken party to keep everyone safe.

The film reminded me quite a bit of Tremors (1990), a movie I loved as a kid. It has those same comic horror sensibilities. But Tremors had Kevin Bacon, Fred Ward, Michael Gross, and Reba freaking McEntire. While the cast of Grabbers holds its own, they don’t have the same charm, nor comic timing. None of the jokes are as good either. I was mostly mildly amused throughout, but rarely did I really laugh. Made in 1990 Tremors used all practical effects too, while Grabbers uses the same CGI sludge we see in everything now. The Graboids in Tremors might not look as “real” as the Grabers but they sure do look cooler.

There’s quite a bit of Slither (2006) DNA here as well, and one scene is quite reminiscent of Gremlins (1984). All of those are better films than Grabbers. But the thing is, Grabbers isn’t a bad time at the movies. It is an entertaining hour and a half. It just could have been so much better.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: House of Usher (1960)

house of usher poster

As a producer, Roger Corman helped launch the careers of Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese, Jack Nicholson, Peter Bogdanovich, and Jonathan Demme. His films were very low-budget, often exploitive, but they almost always made money. He famously developed a strategy as a producer and distributor that allowed directors to have full creative control (within budget, of course) as long as they had a scene of violence and/or sex every fifteen minutes.

He’s produced an astonishing 512 films in his life (and at the age of 96 IMDB lists at least one upcoming project with his name on it). And though with a few exceptions, he stopped directing in the early 1970s he managed to helm over fifty films.

The most famous of those films are a series of eight films (very) loosely based on the writings of Edgar Allan Poe. House of the Usher was the first of those adaptations. It is a good one.

Phillip Winthrop (Mark Damon) travels to the titular House of Usher, a grand, decaying, gothic old mansion, to visit his fiance Madeline Usher (Myrna Fahey). He is told by the family butler, Bristol (Harry Ellerby) that she is very ill and bedridden. When he demands to see her anyway he is taken to see her brother Roderick (Vincent Price)

Roderick is afflicted with an illness that enhances all of his senses so that the slightest noise, or light, or rough surface drives him to near madness (well, as we’ll see later to total madness). He says his sister is afflicted with the same illness and tells a tale of their entire bloodline being infected with madness so intense it has affected the house itself.

He begs, no he demands that Phillip leave the house but he refuses. This only serves to drive Roderick further into madness and in turn, he drives Madeline to the very edge. Roderick is so intent in his belief that Madeline should not leave the house, nor marry, nor have children that he is prepared to murder her himself.

Corman makes great use of his sets. The mansion is sprawling with a seemingly endless set of rooms, hallways, and secret corridors. As Roderick’s insanity grows the house begins to crumble.

I’m used to watching gothic horror films being shot in stark black and white with great shadows overcoming the scenes, so it is surprising to see this in full, glorious color. It looks magnificent. There is a dream sequence toward the end that is saturated in color and even a bit psychedelic.

Mark Damon is a bit stiff, and Myrna Fahey is just ok, but good golly is Vincent Price great in this. I’m a huge fan of the actor and he’s full-throttling the role as only he can but it works oh-so-well here.

It is a bit slow to get going as these types of gothic melodramas can be, but once it gets into gear it’s a great deal of fun to watch.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: The Brides of Dracula (1960)

brides of drcula

Some of the best Hammer Horror films are the ones where they essentially remake the classic Universal Horror movies. Remake isn’t really the right word for the Hammer versions of the classic Universal Monsters (Frankenstein, Dracula, The Mummy, and the Wolfman) often differ greatly from their Universal origins. The Hammer films were much more violent and sexual than the original films, and just as stylish. They all appear a bit tame by today’s standards, but realizing that many of them were made in the late 1950s and early 1960s it is fairly astounding that they got away with so much.

The Brides of Dracula is the first sequel to Horror of Dracula (1958) (they made several more). Christopher Lee was great in that one as Dracula, but he died at the end so they couldn’t put him in this sequel (he is very much missed here and so he shows up again, despite being dead, in the next movie). Peter Cushing does return as Dr. Van Helsing.

A French school teacher, Marianne (Yvonne Monlaur) takes a position at an all-girls school in Transylvania. She takes the usual rickety coach through the usual creepy woods in the usual middle of the night. When they stop off at a little village for a bite to eat, the coach driver gets spooked and abandons her.

The innkeepers fret about, warning Marianne that she can’t possibly stay the night in their village alone. Just about that time in walks Baroness Meinster (Martita Hunt). She’s old and creepy but kindly offers to put Marianne up for the night in her castle. Despite the innkeeper’s warnings, she agrees.

There she finds a strange servant and the Baroness’s son Baron Meinster (David Peel) locked in his room and chained to the wall. The Baroness warns that he is ill and maybe a bit crazy, but he’s nice to Marianne, and handsome so she unlocks him.

Of course, he’s a vampire. Of course, he pretty quickly starts turning the pretty ladies of the village into his brides and has his eyes on Marianne.

This is where Van Helsing comes in. He does his usual thing which eventually leads to a showdown with the vampire. I won’t spoil it but it has one of the best vampire kills in all of vampire moviedom.

The thing is I generally find Hammer Horror films to be slightly tedious in terms of plot and pacing. The Brides of Dracula is no different. The plot just kind of plods along. It takes ages for a vampire to show up and ages still for Van Helsing to come along. Even then the action is often broken up by too much talking.

But the real thing is that I don’t ever really mind. I love Hammer Horror movies. They always build these incredible sets and costumes. They light it spectacularly with all of these lovely reds, blues, and greens. Their films always look amazing. The men are always dressed in these fabulous suits and the women are draped in the most marvelous flouncy gowns.

I love Peter Cushing (he is so much more than Grand Moff Tarkin in Star Wars. He’s surprisingly athletic in this film, running and jumping all over the place. I love Christopher Lee, too and he is greatly missed in this movie (try as he might but David Peel is the palest of imitations).

So, yeah, plotwise The Brides of Dracula isn’t great, but it is so much fun to look at and watch I don’t really mind.

The Friday Night Horror Movie: The Hunt (2020)

the hunt movie poster

A group of strangers wake up in an isolated forest with gags locked in their mouths. They stumble about until they find a large crate in the middle of a field. Inside the crate, they find a whole bunch of weapons. They find the key to their gags on the ground. As they are unlocking their gags and grabbing the weapons someone starts shooting at them. Several are killed and the rest scatter and run. They are being hunted.

The Hunt is an update on the classic story The Most Dangerous Game but with a lot of unnecessary and rather clunky political satire thrown in.

It was directed by Craig Zobel from a script by Nick Cuse and Damon Lindelof. It was produced under Blumouse Production and it has that same dull slickness that so many of his films contain. It looks good and its production values are nice but there isn’t a distinct directorial voice. It is entertaining, but ultimately forgettable.

The hunters pretty quickly take care of most of their prey, leaving only Crystal (Betty Gilpin) as the last one standing. They apparently didn’t do their homework as she is one tough cookie and has been in more than one fight before.

Gilpin is wonderful in this and she makes it all worth watching. She’s tough and savvy, and there is a little more than a glint in her eye as she takes down her attackers one by one. I’m a fan of The Most Dangerous Game stories (and there have been a lot of adaptations of the 1924 short story by Richard Connell) and I enjoyed seeing it in this modern update.

The hunters here are rich, liberal elites and they are preying on poor, illiterate rednecks whom they seem as contemptible (or deplorable if you will). The film tries to satirize both sides but its humor is too broad and blunt to actually be funny. My favorite bit comes when the hunters are choosing their prey by looking through a slide show of potential victims, all of whom have online profiles they disagree with. It is mostly white, bearded dudes but then a black guy in a cowboy hat shows up. Immediately the response is that they can’t hunt a black guy but then someone chimes in that they’ll get in trouble if they don’t have some diversity.

They bang the satiric drum throughout the film, mocking both sides with broad strokes so much that it distracted me completely from the pretty good humans hunting humans thriller aspects of the film.

The cast is filled with names you likely know – Emma Roberts, Ike Barinholtz, Sturgill Simpson, Macon Blair, Ethan Suplee, Glenn Howerton, and Hilary Swank – most of whom are making glorified cameos, many of which are promptly killed. I love when movies do that, and I love how those early deaths give the movie a feeling of anything can happen.

Of course, it then settles down into relative predictability, but for at least a few minutes I thought they were going off the rails in really interesting ways.

Like I said it ultimately winds up being an enjoyable but forgettable film. Gilpin absolutely makes it worth a watch.