The Nameless

Saw The Nameless, a fairly standard horror. It hits almost every action-horror cliche: the still-attractive single mother, the booze-y ex-cop, the temperamental ex-husband, the investigative reporter who is working for a paranormal magazine (and does he clash with his editor? What a silly question.) There's also a creepy little girl, an evil scientist, and a run-down hotel (which could be an homage/rip-off of many things. Psycho and The Shining spring instantly to mind.) The film is certainly not awful, but is definitely marred by uneven pacing and a lack of originality.

The plot follows a woman whose daughter was murdered by evil cultists. Years after the murder, she starts getting phone-calls from someone claiming to be her daughter, begging the mom to come rescue her. I think this was peculiar to my copy of the film, but the daughter's telephone voice is very creaky and digital-sounding. There is an obvious doubt that the voice on the phone is actually her daughter, but I liked the added mystery of whether the voice was even female (or even human.) Anyway, she (the mom) teams up with the cop who is now an ex-cop who worked on the murder case all those years ago and also somehow recruits that journalist.

The characters do not show a great deal of autonomy. They rush from lead to lead, always being lead by the nose from one set-piece to another. I think the director/writers had some good ideas for creepy characters and locations and all, I just wish the film was a bit less obviously just a series of creepy events. Perhaps I'm crazy, but it felt like being on one of those haunted halloween fair rides, full of spookiness, but ultimately travelling rather sedately along a fixed track. There's also a lot of very obvious imagery. Near the end, the head cultist is revealing his grand plan and the image of a spider spinning a web keeps flashing up on screen. Derp.

One notable thing is how dark it is for its time. Near the end, they promise some really over-the-top super-evilness, which makes things become a wee bit silly (really? That's the most evil thing? What if Hitler were also involved somehow? Oh, he is? Ok then.) but my understanding of the cultural zeitgeist is that films only truly went crazy with bleakness and horror after 9/11 due to the overwhelming anger/sorrow of the American populace. This film came out in '99 and does it best to have a bleak-as-hell ending. I didn't think the ending totally lands (Hitler) but then I am very tired and kind of grumpy, so take that for what you will.

Anyway: unoriginal film, but not badly done. The film moves along on fixed rails, but it does move along at least. The characters are boilerplate, but at least we don't have to tediously get to know them. The ending is a tad silly, but at least it's not dull. I condemn this film to the limbo of the good-but-nothing-special.