March 5th - My Bloody Valentine (2009)

3.5/5

A blog I follow had posted some gifs of Jensen Ackles from this movie and my early era Supernatural-addled brain forced me to investigate.

I was actually surprised by the amount of negative reviews I saw. While I wouldn't call this a great movie by any means, it was pretty fun as far as 2000s horror goes. The cg effects are bad, but it's almost charming after 15 years. It's misogynistic but that's unfortunately par for the course for 2009.

As far as my personal criticism goes, I will say, the characters are pretty flat. Tom is the only one who's any level of compelling to me, and it would have been nice if his complex relationship to the mine was explored more. Sarah's "you're just running" speech to him is less than inspiring, and none of his own trauma surrounding the mine is ever taken into account by anybody. As much as it's terrible that selling the mine would harm a lot of people, everyone acting like he's an evil uncaring bastard for wanting to rid himself of the place where 1) he made an unfortunate mistake that led to the miners being trapped, and subsequently murdered by Harry, and 2) he went back to for a party he wasn't really jazzed about and then saw a bunch of people get murdered by Harry right in front of him. Cut a guy some slack and maybe suggest another idea if you're so smart, but that's probably my own issues with familial obligation talking. As for other characters, Axel is set up pretty well as a jealous husband and potential suspect but unfortunately I missed most of that because I just found his behavior more annoying than anything, rather than the potential actions of a man on a murder spree. The ending twist is a little lackluster, though I do appreciate that they went the ghost possession route, rather than the ableist "scary split personality" they were building up to, even if it does function pretty much the same.

Where this movie really shines, is the kills, setpieces, and compositional work. When we open on the massacre in the hospital and a guy is completely in half, entrails out, I was excited! I saw the human heart in a Valentine's box and knew this was going to be fun. They got pretty creative with the killings for having the guy use only one weapon, though I can't deny the versatility of the humble pickaxe. This one did not flinch away from in your face gore, and even managed to surprise me when the killer had shoved a body into a hot washing machine. Additionally, I just really like caves and tunnels, and underground settings in general. That paired with a spooky gas mask (another aesthetic choice I love) and helmet/headlamp create a really distinctive silhouette that made for some really cool work with shadows. It's definitely a product of its time, but this one is a win from me.