Review: Higher Methods

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2022
Images from the Internet

Higher Methods
Directed by Nathan Suher
IM Filmworks
97 minutes, 2022
www.highermethods.com/

A little talked about subgenre of the horror field is the meta “ensemble” of actors who struggle on set with dangerous minds and often knives. Be it a film set, backstage at a play, or in this case, a drama acting class, the darkness will be exposed.

There are usually two ways of viewing these: first, is as an actor who can watch and say, “That’s like so-and-so,” or “Been there, done that.” The inside joke, as it were. The other is as a fan of the theater/movies/etc., which is where I approach the topic.

Michael Christoforo

We meet our protagonist – anti-hero? – Matt (Michael Christoforo) literally in the spotlight, in a darken room, as he is interviewed in sharp patter written by playwright/screenwriter Lenny Schwartz, as the room tilts and the tension is immediate. Damn, if it isn’t shot amazingly, right out of the gate. I’m hooked.

Outside the rave is raving and Matt meets Shannon (actor/singer Jamie Lyn Bagley; I’m a fan from way back), as the snuff is sniffed and the hook-up commences. Oh, not for that, but for acting classes with John Edward Marcus (Aaron Andrade; again, a fan), of the Razor’s Edge Acting Studio. Sharp writing. This is when we meet the rest of the esoteric students for the class, as well, filled by a defensive woman, The Muse (Abigail Jean Lucas), a man-child, Shane (Brad Kirton), a mother-figure, Vanessa (Marybeth Paul), and of course, Shannon.

Aaron Andrade

They all are subservient to Marcus’s “genius,” and we get to see his patter/pattern of mixing death threats with sage words, all designed to bring out the actor in the actor. Andrade does a chilling job in the role, making “The Kaminsky Method” look like a merry go round in comparison.

There are a lot of subtle commentaries of what it is like to be a struggling working actor, or in the case of one particular star, Cameron Stark (Anthony Ambrosino), the fickleness and fecklessness of the acting milieu can be twisted and turned in a second.

Matt, meanwhile, has a secondary motive for being in this class, and that is to find his long-lost sister, Katherine (Kayla Caufield), who took the class from Marcus 10 years earlier. But is he really there for her, or himself?

Abigail Jean Lucas

There is a deep psychological undercurrent that runs through the film, which escalates at an alarming rate after Matt takes a hallucinogenic drug, and the roller coaster ride begins not only for Matt, but the audience as well as the lines of reality and psychology get on a Tilt-A-Whirl-ish mental space as the second act kicks off into literally high gear.

At this point, I want to point out the editing of the extended sequence by Eileen Slavin that highlights the beautiful cinematography by Ken Willinger, taking this from a low budget psychological horror (with some violent scenes) to a cinematic splendor.

Despite the beauty of the image and the occasional knife and drug play, this film is wordy. Some of it is pop psychology, such as “There is no death here; she’s on celluloid,” to the fanatical ravings of Matt, and especially of Marcus.

Jamie Lyn Bagley

Another central theme here is honesty. The stripping down of one’s barriers to reveal the rawness underneath that even the actor themselves have trouble seeing through their own ego, history and general mishigas. Matt is a pile of inner conflict, and everyone around him is pressuring him to be “real,” in an occupation where everything is fake. This could have been tedious, but Schwartz’s writing, as usual, is taut, drawing the viewer in while also being appalling in the treatment of the characters by others and themselves.

Amid the dark and shadowy imagery is an equally dark look at the life of an actor in a very stylized form, where the person is irrelevant to what they can bring, whether it be as a marketing object or as a shell of themselves. This was covered in a more depressing way in the film The Day of the Locust (1975), but thankfully this one is invigorating, rather than disheartening, like Locust.

Everything is precise in the film, from the lighting, to the costume design by Lily Spencer, and the whole minimalist art design by Michelle Parenteau. The colors are as muted as the lives they are hiding within, symbolizing the emptiness the characters feel. Even the music by Indy Shome is electronic and stark, sometimes honing down to nothing but a low, two-note hum at tense moments.

If you are looking for a slasher to watch while winding away your weed, you have come to the wrong shelf, my friend. This is much deeper and thought-provoking, laying on the side of the psychological in a way that director Richard Griffin did with Long Night in a Dead City (2017; also co-written by Schwartz and acting by Andrade and Caufield, among others). In fact, this would be a great double feature; but be prepared to be walking into walls afterwards.

This also makes me think of Bob Fosse. No, hear me out. What made Fosse famous was his precision: there was not a move, a single digit that was not where it meant to be; the same could be said about this film. It feels very intensely scrutinized as far as look, acting, and motion. Even the perfect lipstick on the faces of The Muse and Shannon are precise. The director, Suher, has obviously taken some amount of care to get everything to line up to be a piece of art cinema that could be talked about in classrooms. But to just watch it on the screen on one’s own? Well worth it if you like a mind fuck of a film. And I mean that as a positive.

IMDB listing HERE 

Review: Accidental Incest

Text © Richard Gary / Indie Horror Films, 2015

Images from the Internet

Accidental Incest

Directed by Richard Griffin

Scorpio Film Releasing

102 minutes, 2014 / 2015
www.mvdvisual.com 

Richard Griffin is a trans director. No, no, what I mean is that he readily and easily moves among various genres and sub-genres. And although he has remained somewhat auteur, he rarely keeps his feet on solid cinematic ground. For that, we, the viewers, are lucky. That I'm reviewing two of his films in two separate blogs in a row rather than combining them says something.

For the most recent, Accidental Incest, Griffin and writer / collaborator Lenny Schwartz (an award winning playwright!) delve into the broad bedroom sex farce. It’s quite extreme, but probably no more risqué than, say the absurdist budoir comedies of Tudor-period France, or Chaucer’s the “The Wife of Bath” in its Medieval days. That is to say, this is fuckin’ risqué, Jack!

When we first meet our two self-proclaimed douchebag anti-hero protagonists, they are performing acts of narcissistic revelry, for which they must pay in some form or another. They are unhappy with their life situations, but not necessarily with their lifestyle choices, which would fit in well in any sex(y)-addict group. After each survives a near-death experience and meet some cool and attractive guardian angels, and then their marriages finally dissolve with a bang not a whimper, they find each other in a seedy hotel hallway. It is lust and love at first sight. But there is a problem they eventually learn, which the title makes obvious.

On the relatively masculine side of the equation, there is Milton (a nice, Jewish boy we learn), played with wide aplomb by Johnny Sederquist. He makes the Sean character from the television show Psych look like a mellow dude. Whatever the gender, whatever the drug, whatever the experience, he is there, and ready-willing-and-able. You can just tell Sederquist is having a blast in this role, and embraces his character wholeheartedly. He sort of reminded me of a living emoticon, with all emotions in the extreme, eyes always fiery happy, excitedly surprised, or even when sad.

The Yin to his Yang is Kendra, with Elyssa Baldassarri embodying her wild and crazy ways with abandon. Comfortable in her birthday suit (as was much of the cast), her zaftig form looks lovely on the screen (again, as was much of the cast). Baldassarri, who is playing her first leading feature-length role, is an attention grabber (in a good way), wearing Kendra’s thoughts and emotions on her face, looking seamless and organic, which tends to be troublesome for some when playing comedy this broadly.

One of the aspects of this film that I found refreshing in so many ways is there are a number of twists and turns that I just did not see coming, bringing huge smiles to my face. In other words there are a number of WTF moments, but it still works in this case because, like having all those clothes on Gilligan’s Island, you learn to accept the unexpected as it comes, even as it surprises you outta your skivvies.

As always, and to no surprise, however, is Griffin’s way with the look of the film. While giving a nod to photographer Jill Poisson (also for her work on many other Griffin’s releases), the pace of the film never lets up, and that is due in part to Griffin’s editing. It really is a joy ride (in this case be it roller coaster or Tilt-a-Whirl) that never lets up.

While the two leads are both interesting and fetching, there is a very large cast that is very generous with their talents and bodies throughout. For example, Jose Guns Alves, who tends to play tough characters from ghetto-style exorcising priests to soldiers, acts against form as “The Anxious Man” (as the credits list him), showing a humorous and non-threatening side, despite the murderous actions of his character. Also against type is the usually loveable Jamie Dufault, who is perhaps a bit too comfortable looking being a sociopathic …well, I won’t give it away. And the lovely Tonya Free was spot on as a conflicted love interest for one of the menagerie of crazies we get to meet.

Filmed guerilla-style through Rhode Island, home of Scorpio Releasing, there is still lots of set pieces where there are little, imaginative touches, such as the use of framed album sleeve covers on the walls. I noted Frank Zappa, Roxy Music (Country Life), Tom Robinson Band (Power in the Darkness); Josie Cotton (rare 12” single of “Johnny Are You Queer”; I have this one), and Soft Cell. Also the choice of using both black and white and color is a strong choice for a purposefully powerful albeit comedic film.

In James Clavell’s Shogun (the novel from 1975, not the Richard Chamberlain tele-film), the reader is introduced to Japanese society, showing local lords to be powerful with control of life and death of the peasants, and yet by the time we get deep into the story, we realize that the lower lords are nothing compared to those above them. Why bring this up? Well, when we meet Milton and Kendra in their solo openings, we are presented (among others) M/F anal sex, adultery and affairs with druggies in Mexican prisons, and it’s shocking. But as the story progresses, much like Clavell’s book, we find these two to possibly be arguably the sanest people in the story. Power-crazy Christians, people locked up and treated like dogs, an obsession with a strange choice in a film star, and soooo much more are just part of an ever increasing insanity level.

The original name of this film was Accidental Incest: The Musical (a wonderful extension). While not a full-fledged musical in this version (perhaps a future Anniversary re-release?), in three different occasions, a character bursts into song, including a hysterical rap by God (Aaron Andrade, in a cool, polar opposite role from his turn as a hyper-soldier in 2014’s Future Justice). And Jesse Dufault, who was spectacular as NuWave in 2014’s Sins of Dracula, has already proven he has a decent voice.

Two quick notes: be sure to catch director Griffin doing a silent Hitchcockian cameo as a bar patron about an hour in, and there is a throwaway joke at Adam Sandler’s expense that almost made me want to say, “Oh, snap!” (but I didn’t; I’m not cool like that). Oh, and did I mention that there is a lot of nudity from various genders including full frontals and full – er – backals?

If you were to chart Griffin’s films on an X-Y axis, with his slasher-comedy Murder University (2012) being the median, this film would be as far to the side of outrageous comedy as the dead serious and excellent Normal (2013) would be on the opposite spectrum. I’m not sure that makes sense, but it works for me.

While mostly true for the male characters, there is nothing stopping the swapping of genders as a point of desire. Even with the occasional Seth Rogan-esk slur, such as “fudgepacker,” it’s generally acknowledged that people are sexual beings. However, I believe there does need to be some equal line-crossing on the female side; I’m not one of those who get off on watching lesbianism, but it’s only fair to make it even, doncha think?

And with that last paragraph in mind, I have a fantasy that this film would play in every single screen in Indiana, Arkansas, Florida, Louisiana and Texas (at least), with mandatory viewing from the locals. Then I’d like to see Bobby Jindal, Mike Pence and Ted Cruz have to act out some of its scenes (I’m thinking the one’s with Kevin Killavey as Tool). That would be as much exquisite fun as this film.

* * *

Postscript in May 2016, as I had reviewed the VoD version and acquired the DVD later:

I finally had the opportunity to check out the commentary track, which is filled with about a half dozen people, such as the two leads, the director, the writer, and the producer. Other an an occasional overmoduation (i.e., a buzz) when they all laugh at the same time, it was quite an interesting conversation full of information, as well as stories. Everyone was respectful and not over-talking each other, thankfully. Enjoyable from beginning to end. 

As a personal note, it was great that the director referenced this very review (through quote, but not by name, which is totally fine with me) about Johnny at the almost 6-minute mark. Thanks, Richard!