Monday, November 25, 2013

Gain Me Entrance Or Give Me Death

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If you thought that Ti West's film The House of the Devil was just a bunch of footage of a girl walking around and not much happening (and apparently people thought this? People are so weird, you guys) then Entrance (available on Netflix right now) is definitely definitely definitely not for you. But then like I implied there I don't really know what would be for you, hypothetical weird person, but whatever it is it's not what's for me. Because when slow-burn horror works for me man does it ever work, and Entrance really really works. I hesitate to give away much of the story because I went into it totally cold (how this film slipped right by me last year I'll never know, or forgive myself for) but it's basically (you'll get this from its first ten minutes) the story of a young woman out of step with her surroundings, in the wrong place and the wrong time, and how that comes to haunt her. 

It's the kind of movie you have to turn everything off for, and sink into - that's become a bit of a chore for me lately, watching things at home with a computer on my lap, a phone in my hand, the lights on - but ten minutes into Entrance I slammed everything shut and slapped off the lights, and sank in happily. Make no mistake, this thing is molasses slow and semi-repetitive as is submerges us in its main character's malaise. But there was something there, at the edges, drawing me in - a tension that was just perceptible, but slowly, assuredly... well I couldn't breathe. 

I can actually pinpoint the moment when Entrance drew me in, and it's early enough that I can give it up - our main character Suziey is taking a shower, you know, as girls in horror movies do a lot of. You've seen it a million times - what's that sound out there on the other side of the curtain, oh no! And yet Entrance taps so keenly into the sensation of vulnerability at that moment - and the camera just holds and holds and holds. It's marvelously unsettling. When a horror movie is able to express those little moments we've all had in our lives where we feel that vulnerable, and really put you into that place - well that's what we're there for, isn't it?
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3 comments:

will h said...

Yay! You finally watched it! Love this movie. Really, really effective. The best kind of slow burn horror. The ending!

Jason Adams said...

THE ENDING OH MY GOD. I was so fucking shaken by that last shot!

Rob K. said...

I need no more info, I'm so there for this.

(PS People who hated House of the Devil will never be my friend)