Director: David Cronenberg
Year: 1979
Country: Canada
Alternate Titles: N/A
Genre: Evil Child
Plot:
Stuck within the legal system, a husband trying to get his wife out of a controversial doctor’s treatment center finds a stumbling block when the refusal to free her coincides with a series of strange attacks, and when he discovers a link between them tries to shut him down for good.
Review:
This one ended up being rather troubling overall. The main issue to be had here is the endless series of psychobabble that runs wild throughout here. There’s very little info given early on to describe what’s going on, rather dropping us off immediately with this troubled family and the lunatic doctor who’s ruffling the feathers of the husband over his treatment with the wife due to the belief that the daughter is in physical danger. It’s an incredibly strong setup to establish here and the film doesn’t give us much of a clue about several big questions involved here, from what happened to the family to the previous encounters they’ve had to the doctors’ experimental treatments that are unconventional and confusing to have played out here.
As well, all those issues with the storyline questions leave feeling bored with the film as a result. Since we’re not aware of anything about what’s going on, this means we end up following an irrational husbands’ quest to get past a cold, emotionless doctor plying a secretive therapy regimen on his wife for the sake of his daughter and while that’s a great baseline to work off of there’s little reasoning for anything. Without knowing anything about the mother’s sanity issues, his pleas to see her, the threats to get her free or the interactions with the daughter instead serve to stretch out the running time here making for a mostly dull and bland experience.
On top of that, the last flaw here is that these issues don’t make for an exciting genre effort. Since the first hour here pretty much is devoid of any specific take on the killer kids running around, their inclusion comes off as an afterthought since there’s never any mention of where they came from, what they’re supposed to be or their methods for choosing their targets until much later, making them feel incredibly disjointed and unconvincing. When the full extent of the situation is revealed, that ends up answering some but bringing about more questions about the creatures’ purpose rather than clarifying anything which leaves these scenes a mess as a result since we’re confused about them in general and completely unscared of them. These here are the main problems with the film.
This one does have a few solid points about it. The attacks by the strange creatures are exceptionally brutal and quite graphic which manages to give them some semblance of enjoyment here, especially with the first attack resembling a haunted house ambush with all the various objects flying around from an unseen source before showing the vicious attack on the victim. With the later attacks on the grandfather in his home or the schoolteacher in the classroom in front of the kids being especially brutal and jarring, those stand-out more than the first encounter and set up the grand finale at the farmhouse where it goes overboard with some stellar confrontations and wild ideas that are rather nicely utilized. However, that’s really all that holds this one up overall.
Overview: *.5/5
While there are some positive aspects to be had with this one, for the most part, there are way too many flaws found in a troublesome story and dragging pace to really make this one be of much value. This is really only recommended to hardcore fans of the creative side here who are going to overlook the flaws present, while those that don't care about that factor should heed caution with this one.
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