Netflix And Chill: No Panic, With A Hint Of Hysteria (2016)

A bizarre comedy noir that feels like something that could have worked in better hands, No Panic, With A Hint Of Hysteria is one of the many titles in the filmography of Polish writer-director Tomasz Szafranski. Having started his career in his early twenties, Szafranski has been working in film and TV now for just over two full decades. I don't know if his other work tends to be better than this, but I'm certainly not enthused to be exploring more of his work after getting through this one.

Alexander Chance plays Toby, an accountant who is trying to move into the more lucrative role of hitman. He is being mentored by Fakir (Toasz Karolak), but isn't really showing himself as a natural fit for the job. A disastrous convergence of unfortunate events lead to Toby and his wife (Melanie, played by Charlotte Kirk) trying to dispose of a corpse, dealing with someone Toby quite rightly assumed was already dead, and placating various dangerous characters while avoiding too much attention from the police.

Set up as a classic farce, and low-key enough for most of the runtime to feel as if it's been adapted from a stage play, No Panic, With A Hint Of Hysteria feels overdone, mishandled, decades too late, and (ironically enough) just poorly executed in almost every way. Szafranski clearly knew what he wanted to deliver, but he ties one hand behind his back from the very start by assembling such a weak cast.

Chance is arguably the biggest weakness, considering his character is the focus of pretty much every scene. It's a role that requires someone who can perform with the required comedy skills, appeal, and physical prowess, and Chance appears to have none of those things. Having him acting alongside Charlotte Kirk doesn't help, her being a performer yet to show any talent worthy of some of the roles she has managed to bag, and watching her and Chance interact is the cinematic equivalent of a fish trying to ride a bicycle. It's unnatural, and it just doesn't work. Karolak only has a few scenes, Stephen Baldwin has a central role (and tries hard, but is hampered by the material . . . and by being more affordable and available than Alec for a reason), and other people have to spend time looking mean or dopey while Szafranski continues to move the pieces into place for the finale. Magdalena Lamparska is a highlight as Kamila, we'll call her The Woman In Red, but she's sidelined almost immediately after making a strong impression in her very first scenes.

The convoluted plotting doesn't give you anything to care about, the comedy doesn't work, and the cast give nothing. The visual style throughout is admittedly decent (shout out to cinematographer Michael Grabowski and the others who helped maintain the specific palette), with muted colours and framing emphasising the noir over the comedy, but that's a very minor saving grace in a film far too overstuffed with mis-steps and major failings, including a poor score from Luke Corradine. No need to panic though, this is one easily avoided. I just happened to find it buried on Netflix, and I should have left it buried. Considering one of the main plot points, the irony is not lost on me.

2/10

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Shudder Saturday: The Lair (2022)

Some people, SOME, have been saying that The Lair is a return to form for writer-director Neil Marshall. They are becoming an even smaller minority, but they're around. Somewhere. They're also being far too kind to a film that, rather than reminding you of how good Marshall can be, actually serves to remind you how far away he has moved from his best work.

Charlotte Kirk, who also co-wrote the movie with Marshall, stars as a pilot, Kate Sinclair, shot down over Afghanistan. She ends up encountering some hostile enemies, to be expected, but also discovers something else aiming to cause her harm. Eventually in the company of other military allies, Kate has to convince them of what she saw, and everyone has to figure out how to survive, and destroy, the monsters on the prowl.

Marshall may be very happy with the work he gets to do now, movies in which he can work with actress/co-writer/partner Kirk, but I cannot help thinking that he has lost his way, and that is sadly even more obvious in The Lair than it was in his previous film, The Reckoning. I don't think that Kirk helps him in the writing department, and she's certainly not a good enough actress to make up for the weaknesses in the script (compare any part of her performance to the many other women that Marshall has worked with and it will highlight how poor she is).

I could barely work up the energy to fully review this, it was so surprisingly dull throughout, but people should know what they're getting into. The creature design isn't bad, I guess, but nothing else works here. Action beats aren't exciting, none of the characters are given any personality (which leaves the other cast members hung out to dry), and there's no sense of anything that should be here: no tension, no real sense of place, no oppressive atmosphere, not even good banter between the soldiers.

As already mentioned, and I don't want to seem mean about it, Kirk isn't great in the lead role. Sadly, the rest of the cast pitch their performance in line with the lead/what Marshall wants. Jonathan Howard, Jamie Bamber, Leon Ockenden, and many others do poor work. Hadi Khanjanpour is the only person who almost rises above the material. Almost.

I remember one good gore gag. There were maybe one or two more, it's strange how my brain is already trying to erase this from my memory after just watching it last night, but it's hard to appreciate any fleeting highlight under the cumulative weight of one bad moment after another. And there's no silver lining on this cloud. Nothing works - score, cinematography, production design, etc - and the whole thing feels cheap and unworthy of Marshall's considerable talent. IF he has managed to hold on to some of his considerable talent.

I am happy that Marshall and Kirk are very happy together. I would be a lot happier if they could maintain that happiness without making movies together. 

3/10

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Shudder Saturday: The Reckoning (2020)

It's hard to say why The Reckoning doesn't really work as well as it should. Perhaps it's the feeling of watching something from Neil Marshall that is far below what we've been used to getting from him in years gone by, perhaps it is the fact that the story is far too familiar to fans of classic horror (coming closest to the fantastic Witchfinder General). Perhaps it's even the irritating score from Christopher Drake that swells and rolls around as if it is accompanying scenes with much more dramatic weight in them. 

Charlotte Kirk stars as Grace Haverstock, a woman who is left a widow when her husband visits a local tavern and drinks from the wrong cup, giving himself a dose of the plague. Trying to keep her property and land, and rejecting the overbearing advances of the local squire (Steve Pendleton), who doesn't mind getting what he wants by force. Upsetting a few different people with her attempts to simply get on with the rest of her life, for the benefit of herself and her young child, Grace is soon accused of being a witch. Which means the Witchfinder General, John Moorcroft (Sean Pertwee), is invited along to deal with her. 

Not ever tense or bloody enough to be a great horror, and not ever affecting enough to be a great drama, The Reckoning sits in a bit of an unsatisfying middle ground. It's all the more annoying for the fact that there are some very good moments here and there, but they're in a movie that takes just under 2 hours to say nothing really worth your time. If you don't know by now that a horribly large amount of women were accused of witchcraft, tortured until they confessed, and killed then this might be an eye-opener for you. Otherwise, it's certainly not the wake-up call that it seems to present itself as.

Based on a story by Antony Jones and Edward Evers-Swindell, the script co-written by Evers-Swindell with Marshall and Kirk is entirely predictable and composed of moments that we've seen a number of times before. Which isn't such a big problem when you have some great scene-stealing from someone like Pertwee.

It's more of a problem when you have the movie resting on the shoulders of Kirk, who doesn't ever feel like a good fit for the lead role. She's not exactly terrible, but always feels like she's obviously acting. It's like when a talented child actor attacks their first lead role in a new stage show with the same approach they gave to their previous work. The performance may not be bad, but it feels out of time and place, and you can tell they're working constantly all the way up at eleven (to use a Spinal Tap-ism). Waddington is entertainingly horrible, Suzanne Magowan does alright as an assistant to Pertwee's character, and Callum Goulden is decent as a young man out to help the lead. But it's Pertwee who does the best work, bringing the right kind of energy to help save this from being a complete bore.

I've seen far worse than this. I can also easily think of about a dozen movies you should watch before this (one mentioned in the first paragraph, but I'd also list the likes of The Witch, A Field In England, The Blood On Satan's Claw, 1960s Black Sunday, and a few others). There are even at least two episodes of Inside No. 9 that come close enough to this material to make them worth a watch ahead of this. Work your way through all of those before giving this your time.

4/10

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