Netflix And Chill: Freaks (2018)

Although I like to keep my reviews as spoiler-free as possible, overall, I think there's something worth mentioning about Freaks that COULD seem very spoilery to those wanting to go into the movie completely blind. So stop reading now if that is you.

Right, everyone else gone?

Just me and anyone who has seen the film here? Or people who don't care about comparisons that may reveal the essence of the movie? Okay then, we can continue.

Freaks is the story of a young girl (Chloe, played by Lexy Kolker) who is being kept at home by her father (Emile Hirsch). The reasoning behind this isn't clear, but it seems that the father is just trying to protect his daughter. Or maybe he's protecting the world outside from his daughter. All is revealed as the plot unfolds, and that includes the revelation that some people in this cinematic world have dangerous powers, and there's an ice cream vendor (Bruce Dern) taking an interest in the life of Chloe, which means he may want to harm her, although he may equally want to help her.

Okay, that was a whole extra paragraph, at least, in between my warning and what may come as quite a big spoiler to anyone wanting to go into this film blind. So I am saying it now. Freaks is a better onscreen representation of the character of Phoenix than we've seen in any X-Men movie so far. It's all about a young girl growing to a stage in which her powers will start to show, which will endanger her and everyone around her. And she can become stronger when she lets her emotions build up and drive her actions.

If you like the sound of that then Freaks is for you. It's really well put together, from the co-directing and co-writing team of Zach Lipovsky and Adam B. Stein, depicting a big vision onscreen while keep everything focused on one or two small locations. Lipovsky and Stein are smart in the way they illustrate many big brushstrokes just offscreen while they keep the camera pointed at areas they have layered with some lovely and detailed painting.

The cast all do very well in their roles, with Hirsch and Dern both playing to their strengths as two adults butting heads while they consider the best ways to help the young girl at the centre of everything. Hirsch alternates between being caring and being too heavy-handed in his protective approach, Dern is as cantankerous as usual, and both actors play the material ambiguously enough until the truth starts to be revealed. Kolker is pretty fantastic in the vital role of Chloe, starting off with a sense of innocence that keeps being worn away as she becomes more informed and angrier. Grace Park is an agent who serves as an obvious physical threat, and Amanda Crew is odd to watch, considering she's now old enough to be asked to play the "mother" role in these kinds of films (it still just seems like yesterday when she was the headstrong younger sister of Mary Elizabeth Winstead in Final Destination 3).

Freaks is very familiar stuff, but it's done so well. It is, essentially, a superhero-type tale without all of the usual trappings. You don't get the name recognition, you don't get the huge budget or set-pieces, and you don't even get the bombastic musical score (with no offence intended to Tim Wynn, I can't even recall much of the score already). What you get is a gripping story with some well-sketched characters and a satisfying third act that just keeps shifting the plot points nicely into place while adding more and more danger.

7/10

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Filmstruck Friday: Freaks (1932)

I don't have as much reading time nowadays as I used to. That's by choice. I watch a hell of a lot more movies, and I tend to also review a lot of them. So between that and work and, you know, other stuff that takes up my time I just tend to leave reading until I find myself with a free 15 minutes. But I used to be a voracious reader, from a very young age. And it helped that, as a child, my mother had books piled up all around our home. One of those books was about the lives of famous "freaks". I didn't actually read that book, but I did look at the section of photographs. I saw General Tom Thumb (named because of his diminutive stature), a man with no lower half of his body, and Prince Randian. This last figure was the one that stuck with me the most. He had no arms or legs (I believe the book referred to him as "The Human Caterpillar") but was shown in photographs making his own cigarettes. Having been fascinated by these people, I am very surprised that I didn't get around to this classic Tod Browning movie until I was in my late twenties. I think I may have still been silly enough to think that a film from the 1930s couldn't possibly retain the power it had all those years ago. I was wrong.

Prince Randian is not a main character in Freaks, but he does make a brief appearance. As does someone credited as Half Boy (played by Johnny Eck). And probably a number of other people who were featured in that book. This film is all about people who make their living as circus sideshow attractions, as the title none-too-subtly tells you. It gives you a glimpse into the lives of many extraordinary characters, focusing on the main storyline of a midget named Hans (Harry Earles) and his love for a trapeze artist named Cleopatra (Olga Baclanova). Cleopatra doesn't love Hans, yet she figures that she can pretend to for a while until she gets her hands on his large inheritance. And she can make that happen sooner by poisoning him. Because, despite her outward physical appearance, Cleopatra is the ugliest character in this film. Greedy, callous, manipulative, and murderous. She's also pretty blatant about her motivation and intentions, which allows viewers to sit back and wait for her eventual comeuppance.

Written by Willis Goldbeck and Leon Gordon, Freaks remains a wild and incredible film, even by the standards of today. The characters being shown onscreen are fascinating (as well as those mentioned you get to see the Siamese twins named Daisy and Violet Hilton, the human skeleton named Peter Robinson, and Elvira and Jenny Lee Snow playing "Pinheads"), the main storyline is complemented by some enjoyable subplots, and you have the famous utterance of "one of us, one of us". Cleopatra may be written as a bit of a pantomime villain, at times, but that's the way it has to be to take everything where it needs to go for that intense finale.

Director Tod Browning must have known that he was going to shock audiences at the time, and kudos to him for staying true to his vision, even if it did ultimately bring his directorial career to a premature end (he is only credited on a couple of films after this one, which is a great shame indeed).  Bringing together such an authentic cast may have led to quite a range of quality in the acting, although it has to be said that most of the main players are very good in their roles, but it also makes it a lot harder to accept the movie as JUST a movie. This remains an experience that is at times bewildering, at times infuriating, and at times absolute nightmare fuel.

I am sure that others have discussed this more thoroughly, it's another one of those occasions when I suspect that adding my own review of an established classic on to an overflowing pile is probably redundant, but I will just take this opportunity to encourage every horror movie fan to seek this out. Considering how influential it is, and how impactful it remains, you would be doing yourself a great disservice if you dismissed it as being too old or too tame for your more modern sensibilities.

10/10

This shiny disc is available to buy.
Or, in American territories, here.