Thursday, 29 October 2015

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CRIMSON PEAK [2015, USA - English]
Guillermo del Toro quickly became a director whose work I'll look out for, simply because of a single film in 2006, Pan's Labyrinth. Achieving universal critical acclaim, the Spanish dark fantasy remains one of my top films of all time. Thereafter, his credits has extended to co-writing all the three instalments of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit trilogy, and helmed the 2013 sci-fi monster film Pacific Rim. On the surface, his latest horror flick Crimson Peak's main attraction to me is definitely the cast, led by Mia Wasikowska, Tom Hiddleston, Jessica Chastain, Charlie Hunnam and Jim Beaver. Couple it with goth, seduction and a Victorian set-up in the 1900s, sounds like a concoction of another must-watch. Furthermore, Hiddleston and Chastain are two of the few names that I've made a point to watch all their films.

One clear thing about this film, is that it doesn't care much about predictability. It starts off with innocent Edith Cushing (Wasikowska), an aspiring writer who experiences a sudden demise of her father (Beaver) and gets swept away from her wealthy enclave in New York by the charming Sir Thomas Sharpe (Hiddleston), who brings her to live with him and his dark, possessive sister Lady Lucille (Chastain) in their crumbling mansion on a remote mountaintop in Cumberland. In the early stages of the plot you would know that this is a tale of goth, dark romance, and there'll be seduction, and there'll definitely be ghosts. As we are invited into the siblings' manse, Allerdale Hall is so timeworn and decayed it's awfully beautiful. Whilst Edith's broken heart is earlier won over by Thomas' effusive wooing and incantations (despite her knowing of her father's disapproval of him), once she moves in with them there is very little time left for romance. We learn that Thomas is locked within a twisted family heritage that left him and his sister destitute in both financial and normalcy. Audience is forewarned as well of an insidious scheme brewing, all against Edith.
So when Edith leaves her home in America, only to find herself waking up each night to ghostly noises and lonely explorations down long windy hallways, with an ornate candelabra in hand; one can't help but question the series of less logical moments so blatantly presented to the audience. You start a new life in a ghastly mansion with perspicuous encounters with ghosts, yet you continue to walk down the hallways every night, endangering your life without questioning or alerting your spouse? Such elaborate scheme mastered by the siblings to beguile Edith, yet they leave the most giving-away evidence of their secrets in convenient places for her to discover? Along with that, Del Toro has never been one to hide his ghosts and monsters, so we are treated here with a sumptuous cast of floating and crawling ghosts. Here lies my issue with this film, you can literally hear Del Toro's over-confident message chanted throughout Crimson Peak; here you go we're leaving all manner of hints and evidences out in the open, our plot may not even be the most sensibly written, but it's absolutely not an issue because the film is just such an eye-candy and visually captivating that you would agree and still walk out of the theatre thoroughly entertained. Well most critics have disagreed, and I'm with them.
Nevertheless, I must say this is to-date Del Toro's most visually stunning film. The star is of course Allerdale Hall. The enormity and exquisite details of the rotting manor could keep me enthralled for hours alone. The period appeal is well complemented by the seductive and splendid costumes designed by Kate Hawley, who Del Toro has previously worked with in his Hobbit trilogy and Pacific Rim.
Rating: C+
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