Horsehead (2014)

Great Film overall

Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

This phantasmagorical French horror movie is about a young college student who is dealing with troubling memories of her past by studying Freud and experimenting with "lucid dreaming". When her maternal grandmother dies, she joins her mother in her grandparent's country estate where she uses her lucid dreaming skills to uncover dark family secrets.This film somewhat reminded me of the Walerian Borowzyk film "La Bete", but without the shocking imagery or nearly as strong of a grasp of Freudian surrealism. The "Horsehead" monster that haunts the dreams of the heroine may be the literal embodiment of a "nightmare" (or "cauchemare" in French), but horses are such magnificent and beautiful animals that it's hard to make them look too frightening or threatening. The weird imagery and occasionally effective atmosphere of this film is somewhat of a throwback to an earlier era, and it is refreshing in an age where "horror" is often synonymous with tons of gory effects, "torture porn", and shot-on-video "found-footage" bullsh*t. But the images, while pretty and colorful, are a little pedestrian and frankly just not all scary.The movie does get a lot of mileage out of pretty, young French actress Lily-Fleur Pointeaux. I think at least half the audience will be very favorably disposed to scenes where she luxuriates in a bathtub with her magnificent breasts bobbing and glistening (bobbing and glistening. . .). But she also does a decent job carrying the principal weight of this movie, especially considering I've only previously seen her in small supporting roles in films like "Ma Premiere Pas" and "We Need a Vacation".This film could have used some stronger and perhaps more shocking imagery like "La Bete" or the more recent French/Belgian film "Amer", but it's not an entirely unpleasant way to pass 90 minutes.

I fully agree with Angiris' review above. I thought he articulated it really well as to what this film is 'about' and how it comes across.I THINK that I can see what the director is TRYING to do. I appreciate a number of the visual sequences, especially the REALLY creative lighting. The Ambient soundtrack (NOT the sound design. I will come back to that in a moment) is quite good. VERY moody. This is the ONE aspect where I think the director did achieve a Lynchian feel in the movie. In my lowly and wretched opinion, IF they had just approached the film DIFFERENTLY, I think there was enough creative energy and vivid imagery to pull it off. BUT... what I feel is 'wrong' with this film and unfortunately where it fails in what it is TRYING to do, is just the approach is all wrong. If you are going to imitate or be inspired by or try to have a similar approach to a film as, say, David Lynch, I feel that the single, vital thing ABOVE ALL is the MOOD that you create. Now, I feel that he did this SOMETIMES with certain short sequences. But, where I feel that he worked against himself is by 'jarring' or kind of 'cross-purposing' the very mood he was trying to create by introducing a kinetic visual style and Techno-Electronic sound that, to me anyway, totally destroyed whatever eerie, disturbing mood that he was trying to create.Again, just my opinion... But, I think that if he had gone for a more laid back, static shot, murky sub-conscious approach and ditched all the Techno-Electronic / Mtv crap, then it likely would have worked pretty well. Just the wrong approach. And, what the HELL was up with the almost bloody CONTINUOUS hand-held crap in just about every scene. Dude... you are NOT going for a 'Found Footage' feel here mate. What the hell is the film all about anyway...? DREAMS, right? So, to me, it seems that the ENTIRE mood and visual / sonic approach to the film should have centered around Dreamy, murky, understated visuals and effects. Just SLOW the damn thing down dude... All that hyperkinetic Techno stuff, in my opinion, just ruins the whole thing. This is PRECISELY why I hate the 'American Horror Story' series. Absolutely NO subtlety at all...Look... if you are making a film about 'Lucid Dreaming', I can understand why you would want to let loose with all these GREAT awesome visuals. Okay, fine... However, WAIT until you build up to it. WAIT until you create a ponderous and disturbing and YES, a DREAMY mood, even a Nightmarish mood and then BUILD and ratchet up the tension until you have this great WILD, Hallucinatory finale. THAT would work, I think. It was a shame too, because some of the technical approaches and techniques were GREAT, in and of themselves. A shot here, a short sequence there. BUT... you HAVE to be able to put it all together in such a way that it is EFFECTIVE and creates the mood and overall result that you are trying to achieve.Also, maybe it was just me, but I REALLY thought the girl was LAME. She was not a very good actress. So, when you are trying to evoke this deep, disturbing, subconscious fear in your audience, you ABSOLUTELY have to have an actress who can convey that BELIEVABLY and GEEZ, a LOT more subtly than this girl did. Particularly this really stupid, open-mouthed expression that she had throughout most of the film. Bad...And I KNOW that I've harped on this before, and I KNOW it is one of my little personal neuroses, but the Sound Design was VERY amateurish, and at least to me, that takes me right out of the film every time. What I am talking about is like for example the girl is opening a little box across the room from the audience's perspective. And from where you and I are seeing her it is like 30 feet away. And yet, the sound of the cardboard rustling is around like 100 decibels and sounds like it is right next to your ear. Or, just in general, EVERY bloody sound is HUGELY amplified, every footstep, every swish of material, ALL of it is boosted up to '11' I'm sorry, but not only is that NOT at all realistic, but to me it just is plain stupid and inexcusable.So, yes, I did give the film a '5' And yes, that is probably a little generous. BUT, what tears at me somewhat is that I can ALMOST see the film that the director is trying to make coming through on the screen, but it is hidden under all this crap that I mentioned which basically ruins it. And I DID truly appreciate the EXCEPTIONAL creativity that went into a lot of the lighting, editing, and some of the visual techniques, so I felt that my score should at least reflect my acknowledgment of some of these things.I guess I would say that if you are like me and you REALLY like David Lynch and what he does, then you likely will find this film to be clumsy and conflicted in it's approach and mood. If you like the subtlety that David Lynch uses in his long, static shots, and SLOW build ups and weird images and visuals that seem like he dug them up right from your subconscious, then I think this film here will probably come across as far to jarring and disjointed. Now, IF you are the kind of person who likes stuff that is more 'In your face' and kinetic with an Electronic-Techno soundtrack, and you like more direct, brutal imagery, well then you might like this movie more than I did. So, it just depends on the TYPE of visually 'Out There' kind of stuff that you like...

In my opinion I'm being slightly generous about the ranking that I give this movie. I think the only good parts (excuse my being a simple minded male at this time) was the bathtub scene. Not the battle between 'Horsehead' and our trusty wolf totem, not the story line (or the lack of), nothing. The bosom of our main character is quite possibly the only appeal this movie has, that and the intriguing horse headed figure.Not many remember their dreams thoroughly upon waking, nor any time thereafter. If any recollection is made of the startling dream, it's usually a jumbled mess. As is the case with this film - maybe that was the intent? I couldn't help but take a glance or two at my cellphone as there were a few REALLY dull moments.My speakers were acting up for the first five to ten minutes so I missed most of that dialogue, however even so I can validly state that I feel I did not miss too much important information at all. Moving along; The main character studies deep sleep and how to control her dreams and such (again, I honestly wasn't giving this movie my undivided attention - and there's no way I'm bound to watch it again) she finds herself waking to hear her grand mother in the next room (her deceased grand mother) she keeps going on about finding a key (said key is later found and utilized) and it is not found. Her grand mother soon turns around revealing a face that looks like it had been torn. She (the main character) then wakes after some incontinent flashes of herself being crucified and her rolling around in bed whilst the lights flicker for some odd reason even though, if I remember correctly at the beginning of the film her mother hands her a new set of bulbs. (What?) <<< Lets stop here... The bulbs are flickering because an entity IN HER DREAM, is haunting her..? I don't remember Freddy Kruger making the lights flicker in the physical world. However I could be wrong, don't quote me it's been quite a few years since I've watched that series. >>> Then she wakes and speaks with her mother about the short images she witnessed in her dreams, her mother seems concerned and then she goes back to sleep shortly after the discussion and the nonsense begins again. Only this time she referred to an audio recording of what I presumed was a lecture from her professor. This instructed her to take a photograph blablablablah, look at her hands blablablah (full details are in the film) to help control her dream and she begins speaking with her grand mother. Her grandmother tells her to follow the wolf, not the horse, always run from the horse. OH! Excuse my inaccuracy, THIS is where the nude crucifying came in. Anyways, I'll skip a few hours of detail. She decides it's a good idea (after her mother's boyfriend suggested it) to go to a church near by (in her dream) and this is where we see our friendly wolf totem fight the satanic horse headed figure. <<< This whole costume reminded me of what I like to call Pyramid Face (Head) from Silent Hill >>> They then engage in an obvious one sided combat where the wolf then dies. THIS, THIS is where the key is found. Our main character finds the wolf's carcass and goes "Hey lets reach inside of this cadaver and see what I can find!" She then pulls out (Drum roll please) THE KEY!!! OH GOOD, now she can go and figure out what this not-so-bloody-comparatively-even-though- it-was-pulled-out-of-a-dead-wolf's-flesh key unlocks. (WAAAIIIT!!! How did the key get into the wolf, how did she by any means decide to take a gander inside the wolf, whaaat is going on?!) She walks into the church and she sees (AND EVEN HELPS) her mother give birth to a stillborn (her twin sister) and herself. (Think that's bad? A couple scenes before she made out with her mother, YUP!!! MADE. OUT. WITH. (((WITH))) HER. MOTHER! ...Interesting dreams she's having... SO! The key, isn't really a key - I mean it is, in a sense, but it's also SUDDENLY A WEAPON TO STAB INTO THE ABDOMEN OF THE HORSE GUY! See how random that was? Well... That's pretty much how it goes down in the movie as well... She then twists the enlarged key and it makes a grinding noise inside of the abdomen and she unlocks a door. (OH!!! You know when you see terrible actors holding the sword at their side pretending to be stabbed in the abdomen? IT'S IMPLEMENTED IN THIS MOVIE! IT'S NOT EVEN AT A DECENT ANGLE SO YOU HAVE TO LOOK FOR IT. IT'S AS BLATANT AS AN ORANGE IN THE MILK SECTION BECAUSE SOME JERK WAS TOO LAZY TO WALK 10 METERS TO GO PUT IT BACK!) MOVING ALONG.... She walks through the door revealing what looks to be an amniotic sac then surprisingly (not) her twin sister pops out, they hug and then she dies in reality. The ONLY way I can make sense of this movie is that the unborn sister was envious that the living sister was in fact alive she became jealous and then began to haunt her and lure her away toward death eventually succeeding. The wolf was a protector to stop her from doing so (maybe) and the horse head was like an omen of impending doom.CONCLUSIONThe trailer was intriguing, there's bare chested-ness, there's dubstep music, the movie is entirely random and as fun deciphering as the enigma code... Wouldn't recommend this to anyone who values their time.

Surreal, phantasmagoric, enigmatic! HORSEHEAD is a visually stunning puzzle full of symbolic figures where each one of them represent one particular icon related to imagery of dreams. We can notice, for instance, the clear inspiration in some previous and notable works about the allegories of dreams, as the Henry Fuseli's painting THE NIGHTMARE. And this inspiration is not denied, it's even reinforced when at the beginning of the movie appears a picture of that famous painting... On the other hand it made me remind some surrealistic and artsy films of the 70's, in particular those from European cinema (also French cinema...). The kind of cinematography used, the short but puzzling plot, the enigmatic symbols and characters, the twisted eroticism, the camera work - focusing on certain plans and details... All of this truly make me compare this film to those remarkable movies of the 70's. But of course HORSEHEAD has it own value, in fact it's a great film that we could resume as a frantic journey into the depths of the subconscious, a dream that crosses two dimensions, ending both in one same reality...