Movies
[SFF ’15 Review] ‘The Boy’ Is a Great Argument for Birth Control
The Stanley Film Festival really had it in for kids this year, man. From the rabid hordes of youngsters in Cooties to the haunting memory of a dead child in The Invitation and even more killer kids awaiting in Goodnight Mommy (which I unfortunately didn’t get to see), the 2015 Stanley made a strong argument for birth control. The Boy was the most profound reason to wrap it up that I saw, as it depicts a kid’s growing fascination with death set against a backdrop of isolation and subversive terror.
This is one of those suckers that even if you don’t realize it at the time, truly gets under the skin and festers. It can feel arduous at times, almost aimless, but by the time the climax kicks in, the deliberate pace and disconnect from backstory fully reveal the terrifying impact of mommy’s little monster.
The Boy is about a (you guessed it) named Ted. He lives in a dusty roadside motel that his alcoholic father manages. Guests are sparse, so Ted spends his free time collecting road kill and selling it to his old man for change. When there is a guest, young Ted has difficulty interacting with them – human interaction isn’t really his bag (I feel you, bro).
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The first truly frightening moment happens when it’s revealed that Ted isn’t just collecting road kill, he’s actually baiting animals out on to a sharp curve in the road to be killed. The slow realization that Ted is incredibly more intelligent and sinister than he initially seems is where The Boy draws a lot of its horror. It’s a slow, slow burn that actually delivers on the unsettling suspense and intrigue it accumulates. And the payoff? It’s a disturbingly celebratory sequence where we know we shouldn’t be feeling such a great degree of catharsis flooding over us. It certainly is satisfying, but for (maybe?) morally the wrong reasons.
Yes, after viewing The Boy, your moral compass may be a bit fucked.
Child actor Jared Breeze, besides having a kick ass name, delivers an impressively expressionistic performance. In the Q&A following the screening, he explained that he used two faces: stone and sour. From these two seemingly simple expressions, Breeze simply nails it. There’s a natural depth to the kid that on screen, making you want to stay the hell away from him one second and then high five him the next.
Rainn Wilson (The Office, Cooties) shows a deeply menacing side as a suspected arsonist hiding out at the motel. Him and Ted develop an unusual friendship that drives much of the core plot as the film moves towards its chilling climax. It’s a conclusion that you may see coming, or hell, you may have been anticipating since the first frame. Either way, the dark heart that propels The Boy is the impossibly assured direction of Craig William Macneill and the willingness of the film to take its time letting you know that Ted is fucking dangerous. It’s a frightening thing to witness: Ted’s psychopathy maturing before your eyes.
We’ve seen killer kid films before. But maybe not one as psychologically ratcheting as The Boy. During its 100 minute running time, we literally witness the blossoming of a child’s urge to kill.
And with that, I’m gonna go hug my dog.
The trailer for Ti West’s upcoming adaptation of A Christmas Carol raised a lot of eyebrows when it dropped earlier this week. While plenty of folks initially dismissed Ebenezer as a derivative project meant to cash in on the recent wave of unnecessary prequels that expand the backstory of beloved characters (such as 2023’s Wonka), Charles Dickens’ original novel already made a point of exploring Ebenezer Scrooge’s origins in detail – meaning that this new film is likely just a particularly faithful adaptation of the source material under a different name.
Couple that with the fact that the movie is being helmed by a genuine horror auteur and I think it’s safe to say that the latest iteration of the first modern ghost story is in good hands.
That being said, one detail that immediately jumped out at me during the brief teaser (other than a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it nod to Johnny Depp’s iconic bedroom death scene from the original A Nightmare on Elm Street) is the fact that many of Ebenezer’s ghosts appear to have been directly lifted from the iconic John Leech illustrations that accompanied the first edition of Dickens’ novel.
Here are a couple of stills from the trailer compared to the original artwork:
The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come in ‘Ebenezer’ and ‘A Christmas Carol’
The Phantoms in ‘A Christmas Carol’ and ‘Ebenezer’
Marley’s Ghost in ‘Ebenezer’ and ‘A Christmas Carol’
Mainly working with old-school wood and steel engravings that would later be transferred to print, Leech was instrumental in crafting the iconic look of history’s most influential phantoms – especially since Dickens is said to have been deeply involved with the creation of these so-called “comic illustrations.”
And since the novel is commonly said to have popularized spiritualism in Victorian England, much of the ghostly iconography that we still see in genre media to this very day (including some of Ti West’s previous films) can be traced back to the author’s partnership with Leech.
Ebenezer won’t be the first A Christmas Carol adaptation to borrow heavily from these designs, but I can appreciate how Ti West is incorporating an important part of horror history into his latest film.
Ebenezer will be available in theaters starting November 13.
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