Okay, yeah, second viewing I feel the same. Looking for Romulus and/or Nosferatu to take the lead this year. Still think First Omen is #1 at the moment.
Also this - he mentioned on The Big Picture podcast that he filmed 3 movies in 15 months with basically the same crew the whole time, Longlegs being the first one shot
marketing for this was a huge hit commercially but i also think it’s partially responsible for the critical dings it’s been taking
seen some criticisms of the third act feeling a tiny bit hand hold-y, and for whatever reason, that didn't really register with me? like i get wanting to leave some guesswork for the audience, but i just didn't feel that strongly about that bit
Thought this was very cool, effectively creepy, and looked great, but Perkins is a much better director than a writer imo. I love the ideas here, but tonally, I'm not quite convinced it all worked as a whole. I do think knowing the supernatural twists going in might benefit repeat viewings; stuff like the black smoke coming out of the doll's brain, and then Harker's, took me out of it. Everyone delivered extremely dramatic performances with stilted dialogue and thousand-yard stares EXCEPT for her superior, who was like straight out of a 90s cop movie lmao. Cage was definitely being Cage here, which was mostly great. Loved the prosthetics and both Hail Satan scenes, the ending and the face-smashing. Face-smashing was insanely brutal. I still think this was quite interesting and am excited to see it again, but I have a few hangups with the writing. Also saw MaXXXine and adored it, so what do I know.
https://boxd.it/4SK1z only put in a review of this so far. need some time to rate other films/select favorites.
My main hang-up with writing: Why was Kiernan Shipka’s character talking like a southern dandy? For some reason, I just kept on thinking of Paul Rudd in “Wanderlust” saying “I’m fixins’ to fuck ya!”
i don't doubt others said this already but this is really far from what it could've been. i also agree longlegs should've been played by someone else, namely someone who isn't well known
i will say it was awesome that i had a full crowd where (almost) no one was whispering or taking phones out for more than a couple seconds
one of my few complaints concerned Lee's heightened awareness that was mentioned at the beginning of the film. i don't think they needed to provide an answer to it or anything (they don't explain how Natasha Lyonne's character in Poker Face is able to detect bullshit so easily), but aside from being able to spot that first killer and passing those tests they ran on her, it really didn't serve much of the plot other than that she's smarter than her colleagues. from what i remember, it's both her intellect and her prior experience with Longlegs and her mother that lead her to piece everything together. if this is the route they wanted to take, there might've been a better way to set that up other than her being able to detect where a killer was located without entering the house. idk, i could be completely wrong here, but it felt like an element they were gonna return to and just didn't, but it didn't impact my enjoyment of the film.
true. just figured the way they framed that element of her character that it would be a bigger deal. i'm glad it wasn't, but it felt like it was set up to be.
Oh no, for sure. As soon as that happened, I was like “oh shit I wasn’t expecting this movie to go that direction”. I’m probably more indifferent about it going either way, but it definitely felt forgotten about.
This was awesome. I didn’t realize what else the director made until after, and it made a lot of sense….this could almost be a sequel to blackcoat. a couple shots of cage scared the fuck out of me.