Skip to main content

A Cure For Wellness -- a review

I have to admit that A Cure For Wellness slipped right under my radar when it was first released earlier this year. Mainly because the movie didn’t do very well, and quickly slinked out of theaters due to the bad box office. When I discovered that it had been directed by Gore Verbinski, I didn’t want to see it because I wasn’t a big fan of the Pirates of the Caribbean films that he made (granted, the first Pirates film was an enjoyable piece of fluff, but its countless sequels are a real slog to get through). But I was reminded that Verbinski also directed The Lone Ranger reboot, which I really liked (and I’m probably one of five people who do so), and he also helmed the superb remake of The Ring, starring Naomi Watts and a really scary videotape.

With A Cure For Wellness Verbinski pulls you in slowly, showing an office worker keeling over from a heart attack while working late one night. It turns out that this deceased fellow was Morris, a close confidante to Pembroke, the owner and CEO of a financial company that is undergoing a merger that will make everybody rich. But there are problems with the SEC which might derail this merger (not to mention also put everybody in jail). With Morris dead, Lockhart (Dane DeHaan), an up and coming executive with the company, is chosen to bring Pembroke back from his stay at a health spa in Switzerland. Should things with the SEC come to a head, the plan is to frame Pembroke for the ruckus.


DeHaan is one of these interesting actors who shines very well here. His Lockhart is a cold-hearted bastard, a businessman with a ’kill-or-be-killed’ attitude who normally wouldn’t care about Pembroke--but he’s forced into looking for him at a reclusive spa because Lockhart has been threatened with being thrown to the wolves by the even more heartless board members. Once he arrives at the spa, which is run by the always good Jason Issacs as the enigmatic Volmer, A Cure For Wellness starts to recall the best of Dario Argento’s work as Lockhart discovers there’s something very strange about this place.

Much like how Argento’s protagonists are always risking their lives to solve a mystery, Cure also has stark cinematography that evokes Argento--as well as a haunting, child-like theme (“la-la-la”) that really makes this film feel like it was directed by the Italian master of Giallo films. Mia Goth sings the song, as well as plays Hannah, a waif-like resident of the spa who’s a big part of the mystery. Verbinski has outdone himself in delivering a strange, chilling horror movie that has creepy atmosphere to spare. I can see why it failed at the box office--it’s unflinching in its gory scenes; it's rated 'R' for good reason, and the film may be difficult to follow if you don’t give it your full attention--but horror fans should enjoy this truly original film that provides a fresh change of pace from the usual slasher flicks. --SF



Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Explorer From Another World

It’s Friday night during the summer in Beutter county, an idyllic farming community in Indiana, and the good folks are settling in for what should be another humdinger of an evening. Until their plans are shattered by the arrival of an Explorer From Another World! This turns out to be an alien (Gemma Sterling) who starts savagely killing people from the moment it disembarks from its flying saucer. Local kids Eddie (Colin McCorquodale), Marybeth (Sage Marchand) and Culpepper (Nolan Gay) are planning on seeing a movie, but it looks like they’ll be battling for the very survival of the human race instead! Explorer From Another World is a wonderfully done throwback to the B-movies of the 1950s and 1960s. Ably directed by Woody Edwards (who gives himself a small cameo as Hank in the sheriff’s jail cell), the film is forty five minutes long, but manages to tell its torrid but funny story very effectively in the time allotted. And the short running time tracks when you...
Post a Comment
Read more

Logan's Run -- a review

I first saw Logan’s Run in a New Jersey movie theater fifty years ago, when I was a boy. The theater, somewhere in the suburban wilds of the Garden State, was packed to the gills with people. I wasn’t sure what to expect with the movie back then—all I cared about that it was a brand new science fiction film, in an age when big budget SF properties on both TV and the big screen was very rare (of course, Star Wars , which would be released the very next year, would change all of that). Based on the 1967 novel of the same name by William F. Nolan and George Clayton Johnson, Logan’s Run is a futuristic tale about a man named Logan 5 (Michael York) who has a special job in a place filled with hedonistic leisure. Logan lives within the splendor of a Utopian society whose population dwells within large domes. The interior is presented as a vast, upscale shopping mall where its citizens want for nothing. Every need, every whim, and every fantasy is met. Of course, there’s a catc...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Housemaid

The Housemaid (from 2025—not to be confused with the 2010 film of the same name) is based on the first book in a psychological thriller series by author Freida McFadden. Sydney Sweeney stars as Millie Calloway. a young woman down on her luck who’s struggling after being released on parole from jail. While living in her car, Millie applies for a live-in maid position with a wealthy family, Nina (Amanda Seyfried) & Andrew (Brandon Sklenar) Winchester, and their young daughter, Cecelia (Indiana Elle) and—to her delight—she gets the job. But, of course, once Millie starts working her maid gig, that’s when the real horror show begins. Despite acting like she was in Millie’s corner in the beginning, Nina deliberately creates problems for Millie that make her look bad. It turns out that Nina is a whack-job who’s served time at a mental facility for trying to kill her own daughter when she was a baby, and now Nina’s got Millie in her sights. If The Housemaid sounds like some ...
Post a Comment
Read more