Masters of Horror - Pro-Life (2006)

In the second season of Masters of Horror, John Carpenter returns with Pro-Life, wielding mixed results. Carpenter has chosen to tackle the controversial issue of abortion, but the story of Pro-Life is mildly entertaining at best.

Fifteen-year-old Angelique is running from something in the woods when she suddenly emerges onto the road and is nearly hit by two abortion clinic doctors. They want to make sure she is ok, so they take her into the guarded clinic. Little do they know Angelique is the daughter of pro-life supporter Dwayne Burcell, who shows up just a few minutes after Angelique is taken into the clinic. The doctors soon find out that Angelique is pregnant and that she desperately wants an abortion. Beyond the guarded clinic gates, Dwayne impatiently waits, demanding his daughter be taken out of their slaughterhouse. The pressure mounts when the doctors discover that Angelique’s baby is developing at an accelerated rate and is violent. Dwayne and his three sons storm the clinic with guns to retrieve Angelique and protect the baby on what they believe is a mission from God. Everyone might have bigger problems to deal with, though, as Angelique goes into labor and delivers a baby spawned in hell…

I was expecting a lot on the social commentary front, but Pro-Life seemed to be on the fence with the whole abortion issue. Its focus was more on presenting specific characters than presenting a fully formed opinion on abortion. Those interested in more of a socially conscious movie won’t get much here, though they could read deeper into it than I have. I was hoping for another creepy Carpenter Masters of Horror episode like last season’s Cigarette Burns, which I thought was one of the best, but was sadly disappointed.

The story doesn’t hold much tension or scares, but instead focuses on the siege aspect of the Burcell’s breaking into the clinic. I found this a little boring and the gunfire got old fast. You can only see so many heads blown off before it becomes dull. The torture sequence with one of the doctors was pretty cringe-inducing, but the rest of the movie just got silly from there. Everything seemed to go downhill with the birth of the demon baby and I lost interest fast.

The acting was ok, but there were no great performances. Ron Perlman’s performance as Dwayne Burcell came off as flat and uninteresting, which was a pity. Caitlin Wachs did a good job as the scared and desperate Angelique Burcell, but she overacted in some parts. Mark Feuerstein as one of more familiar faces in the cast did a competent job, but he quickly got lost towards the end. No one performance really stood out in this episode. In defense of the actors, the dialogue really wasn’t that great and the story was pretty forgettable.

What really killed the episode for me was the ending. It seemed overly hokey and while the monster effects were passable, I think they could have been much better. It was also anticlimactic and resolved a little too quickly for my taste.

All in all, Pro-Life was a pretty unremarkable episode in the Masters of Horror series that suffers greatly from its lack of tension and suspense. I’d pass on this one…

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In the Mouth of Madness (1994)

In the Mouth of Madness is a great movie influenced in part by H.P. Lovecraft. Sutter Cane is a successful horror author who suddenly goes missing while writing his next book. John Trent, an independent insurance investigator, is hired by Mr. Cane's publishers to find him to ensure they receive his new book. Trouble is, Mr. Cane's other books are already affecting some of his readers adversely, causing violent, even murderous behavior.

Trent suspects that Cane is hiding out in the supposedly fictional town of Hobb's End. He is sent with Cane's editor, Ms. Stiles, to find the town. Soon, reality is blending with fiction as it appears Cane's book, with all its monstrous images, is coming to life. Can Trent stop Cane from finishing his book and unleashing his nightmarish creations on the world?

This was a great movie. I love these kind of what-if movies. I mean, what if what we read was real or somehow the line between fiction and reality was blurred? What if reality was just what everyone agreed upon? What is reality, anywho? All these questions are raised in the film.

In the Mouth of Madness is a great film by Carpenter, one that actually impressed me. When it touched on Cane's books' influence on readers, I was eerily reminded of Carpenter's Masters of Horror entry, Cigarette Burns (reviewed here).

If you have been denied this movie's charms (by charms I mean thrills and chills, of course), check it out. I actually bought this movie before I'd even seen it, and it was very worthwhile. It has its jump scares, but the real fright comes long after you've watched it, as you start to question your own reality.

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Masters of Horror - Cigarette Burns (2005)

This film is part of Showtime's Masters of Horror collection and is directed by John Carpenter, and Cigarette Burns is probably one of the best in the series.

A struggling theater manager (Norman Reedus, who played one of the brothers in Boondock Saints) is hired by wealthy Mr. Ballinger (Udo Kier) to track down the print of an infamous film called La Fin Absolue du Monde (The Absolute End of the World). It seems this film was only screened once, which resulted in a bloodbath at the festival where it first played.

Mr. Ballinger is a collector of rare films and various "props" from these films, and is obsessed with finding the only print of this film. The theater owner, Kirby Sweetman, agrees to find the film for a fee of $200,000. This is how much he owes the theater owner, who also happens to be his dead girlfriend's father. In flashbacks, we see that Kirby's girlfriend Annie committed suicide. He is still haunted by her death and Annie's father blames Kirby for her death.

Kirby is a discerning theater manager, and only screens rare and fine films such as Argento's Deep Red (which I was delighted to see up on the marquee as Profundo Rosso) He is soon obsessed with finding such a rare film as La Fin Absolue du Monde. He tracks down people who have seen the film or know about the film. Most of them are obsessed with the film and yet others are secretive about it, that is, unless they are dead. All people who have come in contact with it have been profoundly changed, such is the power of the film.

**CAUTION - SPOILERS AHEAD**

As Kirby gets closer to it, he begins to see things, specifically a circle with images of his dead wife in them. These circles are "cigarette burns," which indicate a reel change in a movie. He eventually begins seeing other images, images that are directly from the film. He learns that the film shows a divine being, an angel, being sacrificed. He is told that the act is so intimate and brutal that it changes everyone who is connected to or watches the film.

He finally tracks down the director's wife, Katja. She speaks of the power it has over people, and how her husband tried to kill her and then committed suicide after watching the film one too many times. Katja gives Kirby the film, telling him she wished it was never made.

Kirby delivers the film to Mr. Ballinger, who watches it with champagne until he eviscerates himself and loads his intestines into the projector. His butler also watches the film, and cuts up his body before stabbing himself in both his eyes. Kirby ends up watching the film as well...

**END SPOILERS**

This was a thoroughly disturbing and unsettling movie. I wasn't sure how the 1 hour time constraint would suit Carpenter, but he handled it expertly. I liked how Carpenter tackled the idea that films really do have the power to change us. Though many deny it, films can have a profound impact on the audience or certain individuals.

I haven't seen any other installments of the Masters of Horror, but I do hear that Carpenter's Cigarette Burns is the best in the series. This film will haunt me for a while.

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