Naming the Harlot: The Woman In Black

James Watkins' thriller The Woman In Black displays all the advantages of great scripting, stage crafting and technique: while a simple narrative, rich details included by the director and art department make the film a treasure chest of reading possibilities (as I posited in my initial post, Queen Victoria, Monkeys & the Catholic Church: The Woman In Black). Upon my second viewing of the film, I would like to add a new element of interpretative possibilities and a further dimension to one all ready discussed; we will do the new element of interpretation first.

Eel Marsh House, the residence of Alice Drablow and the place where everything takes place in the film, becomes a museum of Great Britain: like the great country itself, Eel Marsh House is an island cut off by water (just as Britain is cut off by water); inside the house, all the portraits, the furniture, the diverse rooms and statues, could all be understood as elements of the past of English history, with the struggle between two sisters the ultimate historical drama the story wants to explore, like Arthur creeping through the house.

Inside Eel Marsh House: when Arthur arrives, Alice Drablow has been deceased for only a month, yet the house looks as if it has been abandoned for years; it's not a mistake between the script and art department, rather, we are to understand the dilapidated state in a more symbolic manner rather than just the dust, grime and filth of naturally occurring decay. Something has caused this decay to take place, something has caused the grounds of the house to fall to ruin and something has caused the dust to settle in thick heaps; all these details invite us, like the woman in black herself beckoning Arthur to the cemetery, to peer in and see a greater mystery.

Little Nathaniel, the son of Jennet Humphrey (the woman in black), who was taken by his aunt Alice and her husband Charles, died in 1889 by drowning in mud. What complicates this issue, is a brief moment of the film suggests that Nathaniel was also conceived in mud. Taken theologically, which we will do in greater detail below, it would suggest that Nathaniel was both born in and died in a state of sin (sin as a filth to the soul symbolized by the mud because no mention is ever made of Nathaniel's father because he was, legally speaking, a bastard); but what about the soul of the country?

The round object in the immediate center is the head of the child, Nathaniel, coming up out of the bed through an area with a "supernatural" mud stain occurring upon the linens. Why? Since his mother Jennet was not married, Nathaniel was conceived in sin, hence the mud "which gives rise to him" and Arthur witnesses, unlike his own son, Joseph, whose mother gave her life's blood for him (the birthing stains upon her bed linens contrasted with Jennet's).

In 1882, the Married Women's Property Act was passed which greatly altered the ability of women entering the state of matrimony to control their own property and money; heretofore, when a woman married, everything became the property of her husband. The law didn't take effect until 1883, however, which--according to the film--Nathaniel was all ready born to a woman not in a state of marriage (thereby in control of her own property).  It can be argued then, that Jennet was anxious to stay unwed, regardless of being pregnant, for the sake of money and that is the "mud" and filth into which Nathaniel was born: greed.

Nathaniel covered in the mud in which he drowned. Not having a biological father, it suggests that, given the plethora of monkeys filling his room (and that his adopted father's name was Charles) the father of evolution, Charles Darwin, is the "father" of those children born in the same circumstances as Nathaniel.

 Just as Nathaniel was conceived in mud, so did he die.
What happened in Britain in 1889 when Nathaniel drowned?
The "Children's Charter," or Prevention of Cruelty to, and Protection of, Children Act was passed. The law "enabled the state to intervene, for the first time, in relations between parents and children. Police could arrest anyone found ill-treating a child, and enter a home if a child was thought to be in danger. The act included guidelines on the employment of children and outlawed begging." This little fact illuminates the bitter struggle for us between sisters and the role the state took in their dispute.

Arthur first entering Eel Marsh House and the grand staircase. As always, in great horror films, going up the stairs means one enters into a higher plane of consciousness, or thought (which is why scenes taking place on the "upper floors" are confusing to audiences because they are highly symbolic). There is also the element that, as Arthur enters the house, he enters into himself. This is an entirely different approach to the one we are currently discussing, yet, "opening the door" means Arthur opens the door into himself as well. Most of what Arthur does is read in the house, and it is through his reading of documents (pictured below) that he learns of the legal and intimate battle over guardianship of Nathaniel.

We would automatically think such an act would be desirous, that children should be protected from such awful treatment, but The Woman In Black provides a glimpse of what happens the moment the state is allowed to interfere in the relationship between the parents and children: they are separated, just as Nathaniel was separated from Jennet. Jennet being separated from Nathaniel means he is put in the guardianship of the state, symbolized by Charles and Alice who, as I have mentioned in my previous post, could be invocations of writer Charles Dickens or scientist Charles Darwin (who died in 182, the year Nathaniel was born, so that makes it more probable) and Alice of Alice's Adventures In Wonderland (because Lewis Carroll's real name was Charles).

One of the dolls of the three Fisher girls, note the mud splattered on the face.

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland aren't about Wonderland at all, rather, about the craziness and nonsense of society, created by the state who, creating the law in 1889, could take children into their custody and be taught according to the writings of Charles Darwin about how they "rose" from micro-organisms in the earth and water and, since there is no after-life in Darwinism, we return to earth and water when we die. Not being taught any religion by the state then, little Nathaniel would have been condemned to hell for not "being saved." The writing on the wall in Nathaniel's bedroom, "You could have saved him," meant that he could have at least been baptized, but instead of being saved in the sacrament of "life-giving water," he was lost in the mud. This adds a rather new layer of understanding to Jennet's own suicide, self-murder, to condemn herself to hell so be with her son.

Nathaniel's room with the wallpaper that has the alphabet and the monkey, to the left, which starts playing the music in just a moment. Please note how,  just by Arthur's right arm, is a curtain, pulled back for no apparent reason. In art, stemming from the medieval era, a curtain pulled back implied that something was "being revealed," and in this room, the "writing is on the wall."

An important clue to understanding why the woman in black takes the children of other couples is that the parents are never there when the children kill themselves. The presence of the "demon woman" inserting itself in place of the parents is a perverse illustration of the way Alice arranged for Nathaniel to be taken from Jennet and the state inserted itself in the place of the parents. (Now, of course, it can be argued how hypocritical is Jennet being, she had an illicit relationship with a man to conceive Nathaniel, so how religious could she be? But it is important that among the undelivered birthday cards for Nathaniel was also the rosary which Arthur places upon Nathaniel's body in his bedroom).

Nathaniel's room, towards the end when Arthur attempts to re-unite mother and son. The rocking chair plays an enormous role in the characterization of Jennet and what happened to her. Typically, a rocking chair is used by mothers to rock their children to sleep. Not having a child to rock to sleep, Jennet uses it to rock herself to "eternal" sleep, death.

And now for something completely different.
The hallmark of a great story is that it can be understood upon so many different levels, that there is always something else, always something new to discover within it. In my previous post, I discussed how the "woman in black" could be understood by the English Anglicans to be the Roman Catholic Church, which has recently made concessions to Anglicans wanting to leave that rite to leave the English Church and become Catholic (please see Queen Victoria, Monkeys and the Catholic Church: The Woman In Black for details).

Arthur reading the papers providing him with the information to understand what happened between Alice and Jennet. The pages and pages of writings and documents aren't just Alice's papers, they are the very archives of England, the great stories and literature of the age and just as we read them, so Arthur reads it and forms his own ideas and interpretations of what happened between Jennet and Alice as if reading Alice In Wonderland.

Like the woman in black always looking over Arthur's shoulder (I myself am a convert to the Roman Church), the Anglican Church might feel the Catholic Church to be waiting for every chance to "steal her Anglican children" from her. When Arthur goes through the papers, and finds the letters written in Jennet's crazy scrawling handwriting, Jennet calls her sister Alice a "harlot" and tells her to "rot in hell." Importantly, these provocations are written upon religious images so it invites a religious/theological interpretation.

Jennet hangs ominously in the background watching Arthur.

The original reason for the split between the Catholic and Anglican churches were the accusations of sinfulness (the filth of sin) in the Roman Church and the Roman Church accused the Anglican king Henry VIII of being promiscuous because he broke off relations with the church to have relations with Anne Boleyn. The name calling in the writings of Jennet to her sister could be likened to the papal bulls condemning Queen Elizabeth I to hell for heresy.

In order to get the locked bedroom of Nathaniel open, Arthur has to go down and get a hatchet, suggesting that there is a hatchet that has to be buried.

Yet this is where great film making happens.
In Nathaniel's room, the room of a small boy, when Arthur enters for the first time, as he pulls out a trunk from underneath the bed, to Arthur's left, on the wall, small but definite, is the paining of a nude woman lying upon a bed. We are not to take this as Nathaniel being exposed to pornography, rather, that his mother, in conceiving him out of wedlock, was the harlot, not Alice (as Jennet called her). While it's a small detail, it's an important detail, playing into Biblical imagery of the Roman Church being the "harlot of Babylon" because of the sins of its members.

The woman in black inciting Lucy to burn herself to death. Taken in conjunction with little Victoria who drank lye, a cleaning agent, and fire is a purgative symbol, we could understand the woman in black as inciting children to "penance" in cleansing their souls violently because Nathaniel died in the filth of sin.

In conclusion, for now anyway, there is a myriad of readings possible for this fabulous film, and little details can mean a great deal. Whether the laws of the time or the religious dialogues today, films can draw our attention to dramas that would have escaped our notice were it not for the accomplished artistry of the film makers themselves.

Battleship Trailer Snow White & the Huntsman Features & New Wrath of the Titans Spots

I was in the theater watching some film and the trailer for Battleship (May 18) came on and the woman sitting in the row in front of me turned to her husband and said, "Well, that looks stupid." Trust me, dear reader, I nearly busted a lecture on her about the role of aliens in film since the 1950s, but, fortunately for her and her husband, I didn't. Here, instead, is the third trailer released for the film and it's looking good!

While I absolutely hate seeing the John Paul Jones sunk like that, this is going to be a serious political thriller (the John Paul Jones invokes the American Revolutionary War) however, the "end of the world" scenario and the extinction of humans is a  matter of protecting the status quo which may--or may not--literally be protecting the political status quo.

This is what a lot of us have been waiting for: new behind-the-scene looks at costumes, sets and concepts for the highly anticipated Snow White and the Huntsman. Here are three separate videos with great footage:

I'm glad I saw those bones on that wedding dress, that is something I totally could have missed. Knowing, also, that the kingdom has fallen into decay, and that Snow White has to rescue it, is really hopeful that it is not supporting the status quo the way I feared it might. These tidbits just make it harder to wait. 

One last little note, even though Dark Shadows is due in theaters in only two months, there is still no trailer! You can count on me to get it posted as soon as it comes out, but everyone is wondering, when will it come out?

On the other hand, the closer to the end of the month we get--and the release of Wrath of the Titans--the more trailers they are putting out. Here are several new ones, along with a more detailed synopsis: A decade after his heroic defeat of the monstrous Kraken, Perseus—the demigod son of Zeus—is attempting to live a quieter life as a village fisherman and the sole parent to his 10-year old son, Helius. Meanwhile, a struggle for supremacy rages between the gods and the Titans. Dangerously weakened by humanity's lack of devotion, the gods are losing control of the imprisoned Titans and their ferocious leader, Kronos, father of the long-ruling brothers Zeus, Hades and Poseidon. The triumvirate had overthrown their powerful father long ago, leaving him to rot in the gloomy abyss of Tartarus, a dungeon that lies deep within the cavernous underworld. Perseus cannot ignore his true calling when Hades, along with Zeus' godly son, Ares (Edgar Ramírez), switch loyalty and make a deal with Kronos to capture Zeus. The Titans' strength grows stronger as Zeus' remaining godly powers are siphoned, and hell is unleashed on earth. Enlisting the help of the warrior Queen Andromeda (Rosamund Pike), Poseidon's demigod son, Argenor (Toby Kebbell), and fallen god Hephaestus (Bill Nighy), Perseus bravely embarks on a treacherous quest into the underworld to rescue Zeus, overthrow the Titans and save mankind

 

 

 

 

The reason film makers spend so much money on advertising is because... it works. If, after having seen these awesome trailers, this movie turns into a bad blind date, I will be heart-broken. There are so many interesting elements at work here, I'm going to wait a few days to pull out some of the issues (it comes out at the end of the month with Mirror, Mirror). Okay, what Republican doesn't want to see George Washington in the imprisoned Zeus, and the escaped Titans pictured above as Obama, Clinton, Peolsi and Reid?

They'll feel my wrath if this movie is bad...

John Carter and . . . the Anti-Christ?

If you have seen John Carter, and read my initial post John Carter & the Political Language Of Barsoom, you probably noticed the glaring omission  I made of the Therns, the so-called messengers of the goddess Issus, and they are the reason I needed a bit more time to turn the film over. Several aspects of their role appears contradictory, however, if we patiently examine what the film makers have given us, I think we can understand who they are and why they have been heavily encoded, like so much of the rest of the film.

Mark Strong as the Thern Matai Shang who approaches Dominic West's character Sab Than about becoming the absolute ruler of Barsoom (Mars) with the help of a weapon of great destructive power (the Ninth Ray). Let's examine what his costume says about him. His head is bald, which means an emphasis on knowledge and wisdom and that certainly proves true. The dominant color of his outfit is gray. Gray can be the color of a pilgrim, a novice, or the color of penance because of the role of ashes (which are gray) when one is doing penance. However, because gray does denote ashes, in John Carter, it makes more sense that the gray invokes "the ashes of destruction" because the Therns want Barsoom destroyed, and use the great weapon they bequeath to Sab Than to destroy, not preserve. Since gray covers the Therns entirely, they themselves are completely involved in destruction. On his chest is a medallion, which is the means to transport himself in-between worlds and to exercise all his power (discussed below). Because it's over his heart (or, in the place where his heart should be) that power is what they love and gives them strength and purpose. I am not sure the right word to describe it, but the outfit has a gathered, or creased look to the fabric that, upon close examination, both resembles an animal's fur and the sand dunes of a desert.

When the film opens, there is a monologue introducing us to the political situation in Mars, "the red planet," the dying planet, because the Zodangans, a "predator city," is robbing the planet of what little oxygen it has. Their leader, Sab Than (Dominic West), battles the city of Helium, led by Tardos Mors (Ciaran Hinds) for complete control over Barsoom. The Therns appear to Sab Than and tell him that he has been chosen by the goddess Issus to yield a weapon of the Ninth Ray so he can subjugate the city of Helium, rule Barsoom and ensure its destruction and Sab Than gratefully takes the Therns up on their offer. Using the Ninth Ray, Sab Than is able to corner Helium's warriors during a sandstorm and capitalize on his advantage that puts him in a position to force his rival Tardos Mors for the hand of his daughter, Deja.

Dominic West as Sab Than, leader of the warring Zodangans. His people are using up all the oxygen on Mars and hastening the death of the planet. That they are fighting with the people of Helium means the planet is in a civil war. These are all important matters to consider in putting together a coherent understanding of the film.

Examining the lines of narration above, it doesn't make sense that "messengers of a goddess" would, as we later discover, hasten and steer dying worlds towards their ultimate doom. That's just not what gods and goddesses do, unless they are evil, in which case, they are demons. This is just how art works, the values upon which it is built so that it can universally communicate with an audience; that there is a kink in the vocabulary may be the reason critics have panned the film so thoroughly, but not a reason for us to be deterred in finding out what it really means.

Tardos Mors (Ciaran Hinds) and his daughter, the princess Deja (Lynn Collins). Sab Than's strength is so great now that Helium can no longer fight. Deja has found the Ninth Ray, the source of the power of Sab Than's weapon, but her work was destroyed by a Thern so her father is now telling her that Sab Than's price for peace is her hand in marriage and she's not particularly excited about that.

I wouldn't ask you to consider the Therns to be demons unless I could substantiate it. First, death, destruction, chaos are all negative values, that is, anything leading to death is viewed as bad, hence evil, by our culture, but this is exactly what they are doing. Secondly, just so we know, without a doubt, that the great power in the weapon given to Sab Than to rule Barsoom is meant to be used for evil, Deja finds, harnesses and presents the same power to her father so they can use it to defend themselves and use it for endless scientific discoveries. Just as she is presenting it to her father and the other leaders of Helium, a Thern uses his power to cause it to explode, thereby destroying Helium's chances at using the power for good instead of evil. That's pretty persuasive right there that Therns only favor destruction and annihilation.

John Carter being "overwhelmed" by the Ninth Ray power (the web-like blue stuff all over him, which is how it ties into the spider cave and the web of the universe and inter-connectivity of all things, etc.).

But one last item.
In my post John Carter and the Political Language of Barsoom, I took great care in listing off all the films John Carter sites and references, with the exception of two. What character is Mark Strong best known for? Lord Blackwood in the 2009 hit Sherlock Holmes (and this isn't a stretch; Mr. Strong is an accomplished actor with a good range of flexibility in his voice and expressions, so when he's talking to John Carter and explaining what is going to happen, that he intentionally incorporates his "Lord Blackwood" persona is meant to make us remember that character). What was it Lord Blackwood wanted to do? Use satanic "magic" to take over Parliament and rule the world.

Matai Shang and John Carter watching the wedding procession.

Secondly, Dominic West is best known for playing the corrupt senator Theron in 300 of 2006. What did he do? He was a senator making deals to sell Sparta to the Persians for his own profit. Again, I argued previously that John Carter is intentionally siting other films so that we would experience deja vu (like the name of the princess) so we could incorporate those films into a dialogue with John Carter (this approach is known as Reader Response, which targets the knowledge of art/film/literature an audience all ready has when they enter into a new art experience and upon which artists will draw to reference situations for the "informed audience").

Matai Shang has sided with the Tharks (the four-armed green guys) to kill John Carter so he can't interfere with his plan. This shot clearly indicates his means of "controlling" events and people and manipulating outcomes.

There is a power Therns have: shape-shifting. A Thern can take on the appearance of any person, even (at one point in the story) John Carter himself.  What other villain have we recently been introduced to that can do this same thing? Thor's Loki, the god of mischief (Tom Hiddleston) who is also the primary villain in the summer's upcoming The Avengers. Shape-shifting is an artistic way of demonstrating how someone is lying, how they are manipulating the truth to their advantage (but, as in Thor, John Carter is also separated by the solar system from his love, Deja, as Thor is separated from Jane so this provides two strong references to the film).

When the Therns use their power, their eyes turn completely icy blue. We have seen this color before, the rock in Chronicle. As I have said, the color blue can either mean depression or wisdom (because the road to wisdom is often accompanied by sadness), however, icy blue such as this can invoke ice (when, for example, ice has recently broken off a glacier, you can tell because it will be an icy blue just like that color). Given the desert of Mars, we can compare their eyes to another desert: an arctic desert, of waste and barrenness.

If we understand the political language, and hence the destiny of Barsoom to be in the control of the demonic Therns, then their control and manipulation of Sab Than would make him an Anti-Christ figure because, just as Sab Than appears to be making peace in wanting to show his concern for Deja and the union with Helium, so the Anti-Christ is supposed to make peace and be a conciliator (from the book of Revelations in the Bible).

A fresco of the anti-Christ with the devil whispering instructions into his ear, which is exactly what happens in John Carter with the Therns constantly giving instructions to Sab Than on maximizing his circumstances (no one else can see the Therns unless they want to be seen by them). Deeds of the Anti-Christ by Luca Signorelli, circa 1501.

Why would that be important?
We're not looking at Mars in the 1860's, we are looking at the United States today. All films exist within a political context and John Carter clearly demonstrates a self-awareness at encoding; why encode? If the message is politically sensitive enough, it could be fear of reprisals but also because that's what art does: it presents a parable to us (like Christ's teachings) because if it's a good enough parable, it will stay with us longer than a mere command or statement.

The female figure on the far left, wearing the brown clothing and not the sheer gold cloth like the rest of the women, is a Thern who has shape-shifted to spy on Deja during her wedding preparations.

If the makers of John Carter are stating that we should be weary of someone who has started a civil war in this country, and is using their power to destroy--rather than build--the country, and if the makers of John Carter are warning us against making a "marriage alliance" with that destroyer, despite how strong that figure might appear to be, we have to read "the writing on the wall" as in the Book of Daniel, and decide, just like the war-weary John Carter, which side we are going to take.

Deja helping John to read "the writing on the wall" in the temple.

An interesting feature of the story is, John Carter realizes that his body is like a telecopy, i.e., his real body is left on earth while a copy of it is on Barsoom, fighting a political battle. It's not dissimilar to ourselves, because John Carter's "telecopy" body is like our own, that is, "our political body," and just as we are individuals within our own identity, there is a copy of us present in the greater political drama being played out in the country and in the world and we have to decide which side we are going to take.

John Carter first waking up on Mars.

With all the facets the film ties together, and the striving to teach us the language of Barsoom, we are invited to take our entertainment seriously. Given how reactionary the reviews have been towards the film, indicates that there is something far more important taking place than a typical theatrical flop. As always, we each decide what message we will take (if any) from our encounters with art, but it is clear that John Carter wants us to be reminded that things aren't always what they appear to be, and that we have greater power than what we might imagine.

Deja and Sab Than drinking from the wedding chalice.

The Beat Generation Revisited & a Teaser Trailer For a Trailer...

With a glittering, all-star cast, On the Road looks to be what the Beat Generation was all for, socialism and a wild time. The Beat Generation created an aesthetic which retains its unique identity today, but proved unsustainable (all the "stars" either died when they were young or lived too long and became irrelevant). No release date has been set for it yet:

Touchback, due for release in April, is a bit more uplifting to me because, unlike On the Road above, it's about capitalism; if we take his injury to be the "country's injury" and the game of football to be--as in Moneyball--the game of free markets and innovation, then his "second chance" is about undoing the mistake we made that got us in the mess we are in:

I know that you have all ready seen this trailer for The Cabin In the Woods, also being released in April, but I waited to post it because, for a long time, it has seemed like a sore thumb sticking out; it makes a little more sense now.

We can answer these questions on our own: what is it that isn't what it appears to be? What is it that is wanting to punish us? What is it that wants us to "split up?" We all have our own answers to these questions, but the point is, six years ago, would these have been questions that we would even have considered asking ourselves?
Did you doubt me about Ridley Scott?
Who in Hollywood releases a teaser trailer for a trailer? If you are interested, you can view a few new glimpses of Prometheus here in anticipation of a new trailer about to be released...

 The newest James Bond installment, Skyfall, is starting to look very interesting indeed; the simple black and white logo design lets us know that nothing will be black and white in this film and, along with a look at Oscar winning villain Javier Bardem (below) we get this delicious little snippet: Bond's loyalty to M is tested as her past comes back to haunt her. As MI6 comes under attack, 007 must track down and destroy the threat, no matter how personal the cost.  

It's always bad when the villain is "disguised" as a good guy, but what villain is trying to disguise himself as a good guy in today's world?

It also appears that the 1987 flop Garbage Pail Kids will be remade... In the Book of Proverbs, it is written that he who does not learn from another's  mistake is a fool; it doesn't even bother to say what one is who doesn't learn from his own mistake.
And, here is a new image from the upcoming Mirror, Mirror being released March 30:

Before Mirror, Mirror comes out, I will be examining both the original Grim Brothers fairy tale of Snow White (both the Grimm Brothers are given credit as screenwriters) and the Walt Disney Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (which is how most people are familiar with the tale). What should we be looking for? Well, in Mirror, Mirror, we know that the wonderful Sean Bean plays "The King," so we may actually see the king dying (which, in today's economy, and questions of violations against the American Constitution, could be very important) but the real hook in the trailer for me is when the Evil Queen (Julia Roberts) proposes to sweep the young prince Andrew (Armie Hammer) off his feet so her financial troubles will be over; who else, in the government, is having financial troubles?

AND...
Good news for fans of Chronicle, YES (I have never been so happy about a sequel except maybe for A Game of Shadows)! There will be a sequel! Hooray! Bad news for people everywhere, Project X is also set to have a sequel. Wow, it must really be nice to have so much money that you can just blow on really stupid stuff.

 Keira Knightley's and Jude Law's Anna Karenina has a US release date of November, followed by a remake of Robocop in 2013. . . . the only good thing about this remake of AK, is that the incomparable Tom Stoppard is the screenwriter.

This Is Not a Film, documenting Jafar Panahi's house arrest in Tehran, Iran, for making films (he has been sentenced to six years in prison and banned from making films for 20 years) was filmed primarily on is iPhone and smuggled into France via a wedding cake so the rest of the world could see. It shows discussions with his lawyer and family, detailing the importance of art and films in our lives and his sacrifices. If you have a chance to see it, do.

Mr. Daniel Craig as James Bond, press release photo for Skyfall

Along with a tagline more revealing of what James Bond will be battling in the November release of Skyfall are a couple of new photos. Bond films have done an expert job of providing the landscape in-sync with Bond's moods and spiritual states so what we are seeing above and below is probably going to be indicative of the greater film.

The villain's hideout called the "Skyfall Lounge."

Bond's British super-car, the Astin Martin, returns.

You Have the Key: Silent House

Chris Kentis and Laura Lau have received super harsh critiques for their new horror flick Silent House starring Elizabeth Olsen as Sarah Murphy. You know that I have to include spoilers so the entire film can be considered, so if you want to see the film before you know the ending, stop reading and go see the film. Why would critics have such an over-reacted response to this film? I think the vast majority of it has to do with denial, not just about child abuse and the damages it causes, but about female sexuality and how sexual experiences and encounters can hurt women.

While the poster says, "Inspired by true events," there is the familiar disclaimer at the end of the film saying that any similarity to actual persons is completely coincidental, or whatever legal language they use. "The silence will kill you," is absolutely right, it will kill you, and her and us and everyone, because if we are not silent about what takes place in this film, healing can start to happen, for them or for us. There's a part when Sarah has heard something upstairs and John and Sarah are walking around; John suddenly opens up a closed door and it violently bumps into Sarah and she complains about it. One of the many "illustrations" the film provides about how John "opened up" Sarah (sexually) and the wounds he caused her. But something like that would be considered a "virtue" by society's standards because women should be sexually mature and experienced, according to the government. In this light, we can see the opening of the door as the "opening of opportunity" to experiment sexually that free birth control offers. This is why there is only "artificial light" throughout the film to see with, because natural light (religious truth) would let us know how obviously wrong these things are, but artificial light (the truth manufactured by society) doesn't make it seem so bad.

It would be completely reasonable for someone to say, "But a father sexually abusing his daughter and daughter's friend while his brother is watching, is an extreme situation that would damage anyone," and they would be right; however, this is in a long line of films attempting to curtail our sexual practices (which, of course, I think is a good thing): Gone, This Means War, Shame, Immortals, all examine how our identity is destroyed by sex (and I mean sexual activity outside the bonds of marriage) and the damage Sarah has received as a result (when the film opens, her ex-boyfriend is trying to get back with her and she doesn't want to be involved with him, so we can deduce that she has a real problem forming relationships) isn't just about Sarah, but about all women.

The three main characters: Uncle Peter (Eric Sheffer Stevens), John Murphy (Sarah's dad, Adam Trese) and Sarah (Elizabeth Olsen). They have decided to sell the lakeside home so they are working at rebuilding and remodeling. In this scene above, Peter has discovered mold he has pointed out to John growing inside the walls. It's not until the very end of the film that we see the whole exterior of the house and it has, including the basement, four levels: the main level, an upstairs and an upper-upstairs (a third floor) where there is a pool table that plays an important role in the film. This is one of the great parts of the film, because Peter has found the mold and leads John back to it, wanting John to see it, instead of just telling him about it, which, we find out, is what happened with Sarah's sexual abuse: John wanted Peter to see it. Just as John and Peter take Polaroid shots of the mold growing in the walls of the house, so they took Polaroid shots of Sarah and Sophia when John was abusing them. When Peter shows Sarah and John the mold growing inside the walls, Sarah asks, "Can't we just cover it up?" because that is exactly what Sarah has been doing her whole life, "covering it up."

Not all women have been sexually abused, especially by their fathers, however, if we take this symbolically, the way the entire film is meant to be read, then we can understand why liberals would be upset with it: it's the founding father and Uncle Sam that have abused women by moving them into a "man's role" and we can trace this back to the liquor bottles and the urinal in the bathroom (by founding father I don't mean Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Hamilton, etc., rather, the legislative body making decisions about laws and changing social norms as a result of those laws). When Sarah was little, and she wore a frilly pink and white tutu, her father would get her drunk and molest her. We see a horrifying image of a little girl (which, as the film goes on, you deduce is Sarah herself) playing in a bathtub with liquor bottles and the water turning to blood; then a urinal that has been put up high on the wall and blood starts coming out of that. On the one level, women have become "drunk on power and wealth" as a result of being in the work place and don't want to give that up (and it dampens the horror of what has been done to us) but the blood means that Sarah's father broke her hymen and that is the blood from losing her virginity.

The green jacket Sarah wears, like an army jacket, ties in with the "stalker" because that's what color he is covered in. Sarah wears purple stalkings/leggings, because purple is the color of suffering and our legs symbolize how we "stand" in relation to others and ourselves, our will (because the feet and legs are attached) her outfit reveals to us how suffering has characterized her life. The orange scarf she wears, a symbol of "vitality" or life, is around her neck and means that what is guiding her (the neck is like a "yoke" or a collar, what it is that leads us) is a desire for life she doesn't have, maybe giving that ex-boyfriend a second chance that she hasn't been able to before now. But there is a part of her leggings hidden by her skirt, and that is what this is really all about, the suffering that has come to her from what should have remained hidden but what was exposed (under her skirt being exposed).

The liquor bottles refers to women behaving like men and taking on the morals of men and how they drink (the word "slut," technically means a woman with the morals of a man), but also, the workplace and women moving into the "sphere of men" represented by the urinal (in the home, there are toilets, and, granted, there are some urinals in "man caves," but for the most part urinals are only found in men's restrooms in public places such as work). Another aspect of women being "raped" by the social norms pushing them further than they want to go is the "stalker," the man covered in mud that acts as Sarah's psychoanalytic double.

The directors make excellent use of light and reflections, of incorporating the things one would naturally find in an old house and instilling them with deep meaning. But they also do a great job of maintaining an ambiguity, which is essential for this kind of film, for two reasons: one, we can never fully enter into the mind or the pain of Sarah, we can only glimpse it, and secondly, by only implying certain things, it causes the audience to "fill in" with their own experience the gaps, thereby causing the audience to invest themselves in Sarah's struggle. This is the room wherein Sarah "finds" her father, bound and tied with a gash in his head (there is a red and white gingham curtain in the middle of this shot and in trying to take that down, John's body falls out on top of Sarah). Why this room? Look at how things are "covered up" and there's a ridiculous number of lamps with no shades (nothing to block out "the light of truth" from coming through). Because there is no power in the house, there is no way o f "turning the light on," and we could liken this to Gone, and the lack of religious foundation that film had is symbolized as a loss of power in Silent House: if Gone and Silent House had the power of rhetoric provided by the Church, that would be the "power" to illuminate the lamps and the truth of what is happening to women.

The only time we get a clear view of the "stalker," (who, in the beginning of the film, you think is going to be an actual man but isn't) is towards the end when he stands in clear view with the little girl beside him (i.e., a projection of Sarah as a little girl) and his arm is around her, as if protecting her. Because Sarah hasn't developed normally, she is both stuck as being a little girl and being abnormally masculine because she has to defend herself (in the typical horror film vein, at one point, Sarah takes a large kitchen knife which symbolizes a phallus she has armed herself with). The "stalker" appears to be covered in a greenish mud, reflective of the "dirt of sin" with which Sarah's abuse has soiled her and the jacket she wears in the early part of the show. What's interesting about the "stalker" is Sarah's attempts at escaping from him, because that's exactly how it is psychologically. When she hides under the table, just as she hid from her father when she was little, the "stalker" grabs her leg, just as her father did, and pulls her out; the "stalker" isn't stalking Sarah, but her father, and wants Sarah to "join him," to be united with him in carrying out justice against him, but she's too afraid because she has tried to forget and has forgotten about that part of herself that now seems threatening.

When Sophia briefly stops by in the beginning of the film, she mentions to Sarah, "You always had such great hair," because hair is symbolic of our thoughts (the more messed up our hair, the more messed up our thoughts) we can read into this that Sarah was always good at keeping the abuse and what it was doing to her out of her mind; when Sophia tries to get Sarah to remember who she is, that they grew up playing together, Sarah tells her, "I have holes in my mind," a line Sophia will repeat to Sarah later; but Sarah doesn't have holes, she has remembered everything, she has just buried it, and that's why Sarah has to go into the basement, where we (symbolically) bury things and why the "stalker" is covered in med: he is what has become "unburied."

So what triggers the memories?
Two things, first of all, Sophia, and we know that Sophia showing up and reminding Sarah of "playing when they were little" is a trigger because Sophia is on a bike, and the bike means that Sophia herself is a "vehicle" for how the events unfold. The second trigger for Sarah to start remembering all these things that happened to her when she was little is going through her things that she says were her "cousins'" but actually belonged to herself. Just seeing the pink and white tutu and the little red lunch box is enough to make her "lose" her grip on her memories and make her want to do to her father what he did to her: kill him.

Like all great horror films, (The Shining, Scream, Halloween, Night of the Living Dead, etc.) the house is an actual character, a symbol for the soul (regrettably, this was the best shot I could find of it) but we don't see the house until the very last shot of the film, because, until the very last shot of the film, we really don't see Sarah as she is. All the different levels of the house mirrors the different levels of  Sarah's mind and soul and, just as the house is silent, because a house can't talk, so Sarah has bee silent about everything that happened to her. "Squatters" had been breaking into the house and using it, and, because this is a psychological film, we know that "squatters" are really casual sexual relationships with men who never "moved in" with Sarah and bought the property, so to speak, she is the house and she has had a long history of one-night stands. But all the windows are boarded up because "they were broken" so, since windows symbolize reflection" and self-knowledge, we know Sarah has not been able to fulfill herself as a person because her ability to "reflect" on her life was smashed ("broken," just like her hymen).

Yes, that is what daddy did to his little girl, killed her.  Psychologically, when we hurt someone, verbally or physically, it's because, in our own mind, that is the proper measure of justice they deserve for how badly they have hurt us (if you shove me, I will shove you equally). Because John Murphy didn't want anyone to see what he was doing to her, Sarah (as the "stalker") gouges out John's eye (this happens when he falls on top of her but his eye is in place later when she finds him again). She puts duct tape over his mouth because he always told her to "be quiet" or she would wake up mommy. She bound his hands because Sarah was "powerless" to do anything to save herself (arms and hands symbolize our strength).

This is the back door, which had a ton of junk covering it up. When something happens, such as a key doesn't work, they can't find the key, it's jammed, that is all psychological for what is really happening inside the main character. When Sophia shows up the second time, she hands Sarah a key and Sarah says, that's not the key to the door, and Sophia tells her it's the key to the way out. It just so happens it opens the little red lunchbox Sarah found earlier; when she threw away the pink tutu and Barbie dolls, she found the lunch box, tried to get it open and couldn't. Red, if you will remember, is the color of the appetites, and the lunch box of course refers to the appetites because it holds food. What the lunchbox holds that Sarah discovers when she opens it are Polaroids of herself (and Sophia?) when they were little being abused by Sarah's father. We had seen "piles" of Polaroids before (John picks up several little piles just a moment before he "disappears" and then Peter finds some before he gets shot and puts them in the front of his pants). When Sarah goes through the pictures, she finally remembers and everything comes into place for her that she was the toy for her father's appetites. Why Polaroids? Because they didn't need to be developed, so no one would know what John was doing to her.

Like we have discussed in Scream, stairways symbolize our thoughts, so when someone is going up, that symbolizes a "higher plane of thought" and when they are going down, that shows a digression into the lower passions (please see Decoding the Decoding: Scream for more). In the short clip below, Sarah has done what every heroine of a horror film has to do: she goes into the basement. When she's down there, she finds a large back room with a bed recently slept in that looks like a "squatter" has been living there. What that room really symbolizes, is the place where "the stalker" has been hidden within Sarah, waiting to be let out, just as she is "let out" in this scene:

Why is there always a problem getting the key into the lock?
Because the act closely resembles the sexual act, and just the symbolic resemblance of it will make a woman who has been sexually abused start to get nervous. In this scene, we could say that this simple "re-enactment" is the first break-through Sarah experiences up to this point and that's why she's able to pick the key up and successfully get the door open; her "falling" outside, however, indicates that she is the one feeling guilty for what happened, and her will is weak to go on and resolve the issue. As she's running to get away, this is the first time she sees "the little girl" standing behind her that she doesn't recognize as herself  because she has blocked out all of her child hood. This validates for us viewing the film as a pyschological document (snapshots of Sarah's mind, like the snapshots of the Polaroids) that all the events are about Sarah as a child and what happened to her.

Sarah in Uncle Peter's car as he is inside looking for John and Sarah is supposedly locked into the car, but the lift-hatch is still open. Please note how messed up her hair is in this scene? She has made an attempt to "pull it back," to keep it together (her thoughts, that is) but memories keep "escaping" just like the loose strands of her hair.

When Sarah finds Uncle Peter driving back towards the house, and stops his car, she wants to get away but Peter wants to go in and get John. When Sarah tries to tell Peter what happened, Peter automatically blames it on "squatters," which is interesting, because that means "someone who shouldn't be there," and that means Peter unconsciously knows he and John are being paid back for what they did to Sarah when she was little.

Peter gets out a gun that Sarah will use on him.

After Peter has left Sarah in the car, she realizes that the doors aren't locked, which is an interesting reversal from when she was in the house (and the doors were locked and she couldn't get out). Being in Uncle Peter's car, and finding out that John made Peter watch (and that John is really bossy anyway) is, like Sophia, making Peter a "vehicle" that Sarah slowly realizes in her mind: John was using Sarah to "show up" Peter and making Peter watch him abuse Sarah enforced John's dominance over them both.

When we first meet Sophia, she reminds Sarah that they used to "play together" when they were little; when John would play with (molest) Sarah, it was on a pool table (a game table) and tell her "We're just going to play a little game." When Sarah was little, Uncle Peter would "play" like he was going to get her. While most children play hide and seek, Sarah actually hid from her father, who would pull her by the legs out from under whatever she was hiding from. If we note Sarah's habits of hiding from the stalker in the film, she always gets "under"something (instead of behind or within) meaning she is "hiding" that which is under herself, i.e., her sexual organs, because that's what her father is going to go for and that she wants to keep from him. It also invokes the "proper" forms of play and games that kids should have growing up and Sarah didn't.

When Sarah realizes the car lift in the back is still open, it means she realizes the situation isn't fully resolved, there is an "open issue" which still needs to be resolved; because she sees that the car lift has indeed been lifted via the "rear view mirror," we know that in "reflecting," Sarah has realized Peter is part of her "baggage" too (the trunk of a car usually represents history or baggage because that's what is usually stored there, bags). Knowing that the "stalker" is the one lifting the back lift and then facing her in the front windshield clearly demonstrates how different parts of Sarah's mind, which have been severely oppressed all her life, are suddenly out of her control and guiding her to "execute" justice to preserve herself and her future.

It takes them awhile to find John, but they find this pool of blood first. Why? Again, it has to do with the trauma Sarah experienced when she was little seeing her own blood and her father causing her to bleed.

In conclusion, Silent House is an excellent example of psychological horror, using all the best techniques from the best films, and building upon that (more than one reviewer has noted the excellent use made of sound for aiding the narrative). Why are critics so hard on it? It's about the sexual abuse all women have endured (generally speaking) because of American society (and it doesn't take looking so far to get examples of it in today's headlines). Instead of being a "fun twist," it's a serious indictment about those who should have protected women (John Murphy) and exposed them to seriously damaging sexuality that hasn't been healed as well as those who, like Uncle Peter, stood by and watched without doing anything to protect women.

One last item which was a really well-thought out: when Sarah sees the little girl (i.e., herself as a little girl) in the tub playing with the liquor bottles and blood starts going everywhere, a hammer (the one John Murphy used earlier to "find the mold" hiding within the walls) bursts through a brown wall that has images of beautiful women on it (they looked like Gibson Girls) and that act of violence--the hammer bursting through the image of the women--is the action of rape, the unwanted sexual act and, just as the hammer destroys the wall and the wallpaper, so too, does it destroy women and the men who do it.

What I Saw This Weekend

Hope everyone made the spring forward with relative ease... I didn't, and I never do. I am as grouchy as a bear. Anyway, I saw both Silent House-excellent!--and A 1,000 Words--surprisingly meaningful. By the way, I just had to see Chronicle a second time, it was just so good, and I will be adding observations to the post all ready made (with a screenplay that in-depth, it requires multiple viewings); I am also going to get in a second viewing of The Woman In Black this week, because I missed a lot of the dates, gripping the guard rail as I was, trying not to scream my head off, and I will let you know when I have updated that post as well. I am getting up the post on Silent House today; very impressive work! They stay true to the most important aspects of great horror while building upon it and deepening it!