XX (2017)
XX is a new horror anthology with a gender twist - all segments will be helmed by female directors and will star female leads. The directors have been given free creative rein within budget and time constraints, but all of the segments themselves will involve the horror genre.
Genre : Horror
Country : USA/Canada
Cast :
Natalie Brown : Susan ("The Box")
Melanie Lynskey : Mary ("The Birthday party")
Breeda Wool : Gretchen ("Don't fall")
Christina Kirk : Cora ("Her only living Son")
Director :
Jovanka Vuckovic : "The Box"
Annie Clark : "The Birthday Party"
Roxanne Benjamin : "Don't Fall"
Karyn Kusama : "Her only living Son"
Breeda Wool : Gretchen ("Don't fall")
Christina Kirk : Cora ("Her only living Son")
Director :
Jovanka Vuckovic : "The Box"
Annie Clark : "The Birthday Party"
Roxanne Benjamin : "Don't Fall"
Karyn Kusama : "Her only living Son"
My opinion
“Are you taking any of this seriously?
Of course I am. I’m their mother.”
Of course I am. I’m their mother.”
"The Birtday Party" resembled more a slapstick. Gradually I got this feeling that I was watching a movie from the old days. A kind of "Where-can-I-hide-the-body" game. It made me laugh instead of making me scared. A Hitchcockian story that featured itself as a stage-play. Actually, this is the only story that's not really classifiable as horror. It rather shows how an individual experiences an embarrassing situation. "Do not fall" falls within the category "Familiar horror subject", where a collection of petroglyphs are the cause that a number of youngsters end up in a staggering nightmare. Their camping trip somewhere in a desert doesn't evolve like they expected. The final story "Her only living son" is the most diabolical story. It's more like a "Rosemary's Baby" story, but this time the mother flees with her son and tries to influence his destiny. A growing motherly instinct just to protect her only son from ultimate evil.
Perhaps the fact that these four short stories are produced by women, makes that they aren't very creepy. They are more of a demonstration of maternal fear when it comes to their growing kids. Isn't it so that every mother wants their loving daughter to have a magnificent birthday party? And that at all costs. And are there mothers who don't have nightmares about their children becoming anorexic or their sons turning their backs on them because of a harmful influence? This has been incorporated in these short stories (besides "Don't fall"). The biggest frustration in each of the four stories is the lack of explanation. At the end of each story, one stays with some pertinent questions. Indeed, what was in that box? Did David commit suicide in "The Birtday Party"? Who drew those petroglyphs and what was the meaning? Even the stop-motion film in between the short stories, was quite confusing.
It wasn't highly original. It was very interesting though. Technically it looked really superb sometimes. The still-life pictures of cooked meals in "The box". The successful transformation in "Don't fall" given the limited budget. The gloomy and melancholic mood in "The Birtday Party" and the cruelty in "Her only living son". I only had this feeling that the stories contained much more content than they could show in such a short film. In short, the time span confined the brilliancy of these movies in a way.
My rating 5/10
Links : IMDB
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