Wednesday, January 15, 2020

Review: The Barn


Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2020
Images from the Internet


The Barn
Directed by Justin M. Seaman
Nevermore Productions / Scream Team Releasing / MVD Entertainment
98 minutes, 2016 / 2019

If you’re a horror fan, especially of a certain age, you remember how cool the 1980s were for the genre, and appreciate it for what it added to the canon. Special effects (SFX) were mostly appliances rather than digitally added, the latter of which looked really cheesy back then and tended to be reserved for electricity, lasers and supernaturally excites atoms; the paranormal digi appears here as well. The stories didn’t really need to always make sense, the acting wasn’t necessarily of “prime-time” level, and they were just freakin’ fun.

Nostalgia for these kinds of films are becoming more common, almost in response to the high level expected on the theater, television or computer screen: over the years, the gore and body horror have become ever more extreme, clinical and cynical. These can be interesting, but are not “fun” in the same way the ‘80s releases often tended to be, even when they were very bloody.

Lexi Dripps, Will Stout, Mitchell Musolino
Many indie filmmakers today are trying to bring back some of that excitement, such as with this one. The “throwback” aspect of The Barn is in many reviews and especially in the press releases I have read about it. But this one uses a trope that I really enjoy as an indicator of what they are trying to project: after the flashback scene that introduces the story (here taking place in 1959), rather than a title card saying something like “now,” it refers to the era it is trying to posit, in this case, 1989. That’s a cool thing which I appreciate, and the fact that there are no cell phones is also one less thing to worry about as far as being “realistic.” Every film that takes place in the now seems to rely on “we’re out of range” to explain away the phone.

On the Halloween Eve and night when this film mainly takes place, we are introduced to two smart asses who are seniors in a fundamentalist high school, Sam (Mitchell Musolino) and Josh (Will Stout). They butt heads with a conformist parent and especially the ultra-conservative church leader, Ms. Barnhart (get it?), who is played by the Cameo Scream Queen herself, Linnea Quigley.

Candycorn Scarecrow, The Boogeyman, Hallowed Jack
Together with some friends and possible love interests, such as Michelle (Lexi Dripps), who work at the roller rink (did they still exist in 1989?; they didn’t in disco-laden Brooklyn where I grew up), they sneak off for a concert on Halloween night, stopping at a town to get some trick-or-treat sweets for the church to shut them the hell up (oxymoron intended). The audience will know by the (sometimes literal) signs that they are not stopping in a good place, as this is the home of the titular barn.

Sam has rules for Halloween, similarly to Matthew Lillard’s character about horror films in Scream (1996). We get to hear some of them before the end of Act I, when we get to… (dum-dum-dah-dum) the barn. We learn early on that there are three demons who appear when the barn door is knocked, and you say “Trick or Treat” on Halloween. One demon is a scarecrow who eats eyes, another that carves out your skull that has a jack o’lantern head with a really cool flame inside his noggin, and the third is the miner, aka the Boogeyman (played by the film’s director), who uses his sharp nails and pickaxe to do some physical damage.

By letting loose the demons from hell – who seem more human than anything else in their reactions, albeit non-verbally – our intrepid gang have put themselves and a large number of the local town in danger. Luckily this means a high kill kount [sic], mostly via SFX, so there’s some great bloodletting that is fun to watch and cheer. Since we don’t know most of them, and thereby have no emotional attachment, it’s killed-for-kill-sake and lots of “woo-hoo” for the viewer.

For the extras section, there is a full length commentary track with the director and the lead actor, Musolino. It’s quite good as far as telling anecdotes of filming, digging a bit deeper on the meaning, and the epistemology of the story: apparently, this started out as a comic created by Seaman when he was just 8 years old, and this film is his lifelong dream (up to now). This kept it interesting from beginning to end. This is what a commentary track is supposed to be, in the cinematic home release world. Seaman backs up his history with this story by including “All Hallows Eve,” a 5:30-minute student film he made in 2002 that introduced the Boogeyman/miner character (placing himself as the victim).

Linnea Quigley
There are lots of other extras, too, including the film’s two trailers, a commercial for the video game, a music video by Rebel Flesh, four deleted scenes that were both fun to watch and rightfully excised, the Indiegogo Film Pitch (with the first Jason and Cameo Scream King, Ari Lehman, who also briefly appears in the feature), and more.

One of the comments Seaman makes in the commentary is that the acting is quite extraordinary for an indie feature. And you know what, he’s right. Musolino easily carries the picture without losing his boyish, devil-make-care air, and the supporting cast does quite well as – err – well.

From what I understand, the The Barn II sequel is in the works, starting some time this year. I look forward to it. This was an enjoyable film straight through, with few and min lags and just the right length. If you like films like The Gate (1987) and Night of the Creeps (1986), this may be right on your sights.


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