Reviews
“Shining Vale” Review – A Midlife Crisis Comedy That Pays Tribute to the Horror Classics
Bloody Disgusting’s “Shining Vale” review is spoiler-free.
Starz’s newest series, “Shining Vale” (trailer here) uses classic horror homages to comedic effect to capture domestic dysfunction. At the center of it is actress Courteney Cox, playing against type as a floundering author whose life is spiraling in the wake of an affair and a midlife crisis. The atypical characters and repurposed iconic horror scenes transform the familiar family sitcom format into a unique, era-bending horror-comedy depiction of inner demons.
Patricia “Pat” Phelps (Cox) was once a bestselling author of an erotic novel, but she’s since been stuck in a writer’s slump and unable to crack her second book. She’s been sober for nearly seventeen years but struggles with depression. Her husband Terry (Greg Kinnear) and her teenage kids Gaynor (Gus Birney) and Jake (Dylan Gage) barely want anything to do with Pat, not after she slept with the handyman. Pat and Terry decide to give their marriage a last-ditch effort by spending their savings on a creepy old house in Connecticut and uprooting their family to the suburbs. Pat has her inner demons to battle, but she notices their new home may have its own demons. If only her family would believe her…
It turns out that depression and possession share similar symptoms.
Written by series creator Jeff Astrof from a story he wrote with co-creator Sharon Horgan, “Shining Vale” adheres to the familiar beats of haunted house and possession horror. What makes it feel fresh is the blending of horror and television influences, along with Cox’s central performance. The house wastes no time letting both Pat and the viewer know that something is amiss; things go bump in the night, and ghostly visions are seen and experienced. Then there’s the trapped-in-time Rosemary (Mira Sorvino), an ambitious new friend to Pat. Her style and persona effectively blur timelines and eras the more the two interact.
So, too, do the town’s wholesome “Leave it to Beaver” vibes, creating a stark contrast for the flawed and dysfunctional Phelps family. Gaynor’s attempts to fit into her new high school, even going as far as to assimilate into the abstinence club for a crush, provide the most substantial connective tissue between the Phelps and the outside world. Beyond that, though, the focus remains on Pat’s tenuous grasp on her life and increasingly altered reality.
Iconic moments from The Shining, The Exorcist, The Omen, Rosemary’s Baby, and more get repurposed in amusing ways throughout the series. Jack Torrance’s unforgettable, sinister warnings to not interrupt his work as Wendy offers sandwiches get lifted verbatim, reused in perfect context as Pat attempts to meet her deadlines. Pat’s new bathroom even resembles the infamous one in Room 237. A partygoer in a later episode hits the party favors a bit too hard and winds up peeing on the carpet in front of guests after uttering, “You’re going to die up there,” an homage to Regan in The Exorcist. It’s a perpetual wry wink to the greatest hits, yet “Shining Vale” finds clever ways to use them in context to Pat’s story.
Horror aside, it’s Cox’s performance that sets “Shining Vale” apart. Her comedic chops are on full display, but her authentic vulnerability grounds the series. The emotional turmoil that comes from disappointing her loved ones and the drive to succeed when everyone expects failure creates fertile ground for Cox to explore in engaging ways. Ageism, the potential for inherited mental illness, and romantic and career competition complicate matters and propel the narrative forward even when the demonic elements render the trajectory a bit more predictable. Sorvino also shines as a delightful foil having a ball.
Whether “Shining Vale” will eventually attempt to use its robust horror knowledge to subvert the tropes remains to be seen. So far, it’s a familiar and relatively predictable story that’s updated with a compellingly flawed lead in Cox, fantastic comedic supporting players, and entertaining uses of iconic horror moments.
Note: This “Shining Vale” review is based on the first seven episodes screened for critics.
“Shining Vale” premieres on March 6 on Starz.
Your enjoyment of Strung will depend on your tolerance of clichés, contrivances, and overused plot devices. There are plenty to go around in Malcolm D. Lee’s new thriller—and each one lands with a conspicuous thud. Yet this is also a movie where the formulaicness leads to amusement.
Strung is already off to a tropey start when the protagonist, a bereft violinist named Laila (Chloe Bailey), is vividly hallucinating during one of her recitals. Who does she see in that ghastly vision on stage? The sister whose death she blames herself for, of course. That’s when Laila wakes up from what’s actually a hallucination within a dream.
After a one-night stand with a handsome rando, another too-good-to-be-true opportunity soon falls into Laila’s lap. Because she’s broke, couch-surfing and forced to practice the violin inside her best friend’s closet, she jumps on it without much forethought. That opportunity is indeed suspicious, though; a wealthy grandmother (Lynn Whitfield) hires the main character to be her granddaughter’s live-in music teacher. The pay and accommodations are definitely good, but what about the client? Or clients, as it turns out.
Strung: Anna Diop as Imani, Lucien Laviscount as Marcus. (Photo by: Ilze Kitshoff/Blumhouse)
First, there’s pianist-in-training Zuri (Romy Woods), the walking definition of “precocious child in a horror movie”. She hides behind the bizarre mask once belonging to her late father, and her preferred form of communication is sharing obscure facts. Eventually, though, Zuri is the least of Laila’s problems; it’s her neglectful, demanding, and temperamental mother (Anna Diop) who proves to be the greatest obstacle at each turn. Diop just about snatches every scene with her zealous performance as the expectant Imani. Yet as amusing as that moody matriarch can be, her behavior brings up a good question: Is this cartoonishly devious character the legit villain here, or is she simply a red herring?
The kid’s creepy mask, along with Blumhouse’s involvement, might suggest a different kind of horror movie is at work here. Strung, however, is more like a smutty modernization of classic domestic thrillers that feature big houses, imperiled women, and heaps of paranoia. Keep in mind, this is not a bait-and-switch situation; Alan B. McElroy’s screenplay never leads the viewer down a different path, only to then send them another way.
Strung feels stitched together from other (and better) movies, and your sussing out the suspects is never a hard task. But on the plus side, this movie is often bright and even a little colorful; it’s not too riddled with scenes of flat darkness or washed-out palettes. The music is also another area of interest; certain choices corroborate that comparison to old Hollywood thrillers.
Chloe Bailey as Laila. (Photo by: Ilze Kitshoff/Blumhouse)
So while Strung does string out a number of overplayed twists—with some being less foreseeable than others—it’s a bit comforting to see how some ideas never cease to be used, no matter how familiar they’ve become. The cast’s eagerness also compensates for the general been-there-done-that quality. So often, their commitment to the story is integral to the movie’s best hand-over-mouth moments (and there are quite a few).
Joe Bob Briggs once said the best source of exploitation movies today is the Lifetime network. If you agree, as well as love Tubi’s own efforts in similar filmmaking, then Strung is made for you. This movie taps that same vein of suspense schlock, all while adding a few flourishes of its own.
Strung streams on Peacock starting on June 26.
Strung (photo: Peacock)
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