Horse Girl is one of those movies where the story keeps things afloat just enough to let you down. It’s about a a shy, introverted young woman named Sarah (Alison Brie) who lives a quiet life working at a crafts store. She spends her downtime visiting the horse stable where she used to ride in her childhood; her former horse is still boarded there and her frequent visits annoy the owners. Sarah seems impossibly sweet otherwise, but she’s dealt with some real traumas in her past, including the suicide of her mother one year prior to the film’s events.
Sarah’s sweetness is juxtaposed with potentially disturbing behavior – she sleepwalks; loses track of time; finds strange scratches on her walls; hears voices; and has a bizarre recurring nightmare. Eventually Sarah becomes convinced that she’s either a clone of her Grandmother (who she’s a dead ringer for), or she’s being abducted by aliens…or both. The film does a solid job of creating a sympathetic protagonist so that when she begins to experience these occurrences, we’re on her side. Alison Brie carries the film with a really strong performance that lets you see the cracks within Sarah before her spiral into madness begins.
The problem is that the movie doesn’t really know what to do with the story it has. The setup is all there, but the payoff is incredibly poor. I didn’t need concrete answers, but the film ultimately has nothing to say regarding Sarah’s state of mind. And outside of a therapy session scene, the movie has little to say about mental health, or clones, or aliens, or horses. It ends up using everything for the sake of creating multiple threads to not tie together. The same goes for the other characters in the film, who are introduced only to be abruptly removed. Overall, Alison Brie is very good; the rest isn’t worth the ride.
Grade: C
This one snuck up on me. I suppose I should have expected as such with it being a low budget and lesser know picture, but the way After Midnight did it truly surprised me. The story is simple – it follows Hank (Jeremy Gardner) who lives in the sticks in Florida in an old family home that’s falling apart; Hank has been dating Abby (Brea Grant) for the past ten years, but he’s never been able to pop the question. The film opens early on in the couple’s union which sees Hank introduce Abby to his family home, then it cuts to ten years later, where Hank is alone because Abby’s disappeared, leaving only a vague note. Since her disappearance, Hank has to contend with his loneliness, and a life without Abby. Oh…and there’s also a monster that terrorizes him every night after the clock reaches twelve.
The film inter-cuts between fond memories of Hank and Abby’s relationship, and his sad reality without her. At first I thought the film wasn’t going to be able to do this successfully, but it somehow won me over very quietly. Yes, I was able to ascertain that the narrative is supposed to double as a man fighting his own faults, but it never hits you over the head with anything. In fact, it grows more mature the longer it goes on, resulting in a far more emotional and pondering climax than I expected. It’s performances are likewise surprisingly strong and take after the rest of the film. Meaning at first I felt I was looking at two actors who were going to be over-matched by the production, but I was dead wrong. Jeremy Gardner provides layers into Hank’s psyche without speaking them, and Brea Grant is able to speak those layers out-loud in a wonderfully acted one-shot that will strike a chord with anyone who lost a lover.
Oh…the monster? It’s creative looking enough for when we do get to see it. The horror elements in the film are few and far between, as this is more of a romance movie, but when those horror elements show up, they’re well presented. There’s also a great jump scare in the film, one of the better ones I’ve seen in a while actually. The cinematography is impressive as well, allowing this low budget script to punch above its weight visually. It has its issues, but for those looking for something romantic and mature…check out this monster flick.
Grade: B
Yeah…fuck this one. I suppose it’s a decent idea for a movie – a small group of people go to an island resort to live out their fantasies only to realize that there’s something sinister going on. As a horror movie, it’s not only not scary, but it telegraphs every jump scare as lazily as possible. As a film that thinks it’s occasionally funny…it isn’t. As a film that’s dumb enough to simply have fun with, it is way too stupid for even that.
The film is from the director of Never Back Down and Truth or Dare, and it is somehow worse than both of those films. Its cast of characters is mostly forgettable, though it does attempt to give about three of them character arcs, none of which have a satisfying conclusion. The only performances in the film that don’t suck are Maggie Q and Portia Doubleday, because at least they try. Michael Rooker shows up and somehow can’t pull off a Michael Rooker performance, so you know things are shit. Then there’s the woefully miscast Michael Peña, who never feels like the overlord character he’s supposed to be.
On top of all this, the film feels the need to come up with a nonsensical twist that wants you to look at the entire film differently.
Once was enough.
Grade: D
Motionswee77 
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