Tuesday, February 25, 2014

HERE COMES THE DEVIL...SPOILER FREE REVIEW

It's every parents' nightmare; Tragedy strikes a couple on vacation in Tijauna, Mexico when their two children go missing, but when the kids reappear the real nightmare begins.
Writer/director Adrian Garcia Bogliano's HERE COMES THE DEVIL is a wicked mind fuck of a flick. I saw it this past saturday night at the Nevermore Film Fest, with an audience of willing and enthusiastic horror fans. The film is disarming and bewildering right from the start with wildly humorous zooms and an intense and long sex scene, that (at least with an audience) was almost embarrassingly engrossing. Bogliano constructs a really good roller coaster with DEVIL. He sets us up for a fast drop into despair and fear then keeps us guessing while leveling out for the final drops and loops, driving the audience to a satisfying and disturbing end.
DEVIL's  plot is nuanced and multi-layered, weaving crime noir/murder mystery and the supernatural into a pretty dreadful tapestry. The cast is strong, particularly Laura Caro as Sol, who's the anchor of the film. As a grief stricken mother that evolves into a machine of revenge and later into a mother jaguar willing to take on the Devil himself, Caro is brilliant and mesmerizing. Francisco Barreiro, who plays Felix, the father, is also a win on casting. He's flawed, but like any good father there's no end to what he'll do to protect his
children. Sol and Felix's marriage in and of itself is quite a roller coaster and it's actually the energy that powers the story. Sol and Felix's children, played by Alan Martinez and Michele Garcia don't get much screen time or dialogue considering their disappearance and later behavior is the catalyst for every thing that happens in DEVIL. Of course that may be because Bogliano didn't want to expose the kids to the more gruesome and erotic elements of the film.
It's hard to stay vague about HERE COMES THE DEVIL, because I enjoyed it quite a lot and would like to cut loose with a full dissection of the film and why I think it's worthy of your attention, but I'll save it until after the DVD release. Instead I'll leave you with my mini-tweet review; "A director from Argentina uses Mexico to make a great Italian possession flick." If it plays near you, I recommend you catch it.




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