Frailty: Review By B. Alan Orange

Code Orange Alert #38149: Frailty

(This review will ruin certain aspects of your viewing pleasure, especially if you delve past the second paragraph before attendance. If you want to wreck that event, then by all means, go ahead and be a sh*t-f*ck. You might as well start using the email persona LifeLee, because you're an idiot. Don't say I didn't warn you.)

Odd that a movie about an axe-wielding maniac would peek nostalgia for my childhood, but as I sat watching Bill Paxton drive his kids to the local Sav-On in that ratty utility vehicle, I could all but feel the encased wood paneling of my own Dad's shoebox Ford as he drove me and my brother into town. Of course, while I sat coloring Batman-by-Numbers, Pop never once stepped outside his pick-up truck to crack open the skull of some poor hapless bastard with an axe named Otis. That aside, I'd have to say this film perfectly captures an entire feeling not experienced since I was a kid in the late 70s. Having been the younger sibling, and believing every sojourn parable I was ever told, I would have completely bought into the fact that Dad, though killing innocent people, was, in all actuality, a Demon Slayer, too. And sure enough, my older brother, J. David Orange, would have tried to talk me out of it. After all, he's the one who reveled that that wasn't Santa's footprint in the fireplace.

This material really sticks with you. It's been well over two months since I saw the darn thing, and I haven't been able to shake it out of my head. At its very moment of ejaculation in release, I felt unsure of Frailty, a film directed by Bill Paxton (yes, Chet from Weird Science). I couldn't build a conclusion as to whether I liked it or not. I felt cheated by the ending. The overall notion, up until 1/4 of the way through, is that this is such a cool movie, even if it looks like bits and pieces where stolen directly from Sam Raimi's oeuvre. Then boom, we have another pinch-twist conclusion that seems forced and untrue to the material.

I found it a bit cheap; that was my maiden response. Remember Willie Aames from Charles in Charge and Zapped? He put out a religious superhero show on The Bible Network. Well, this is basically Unbreakable done Bibleman style. A superhero movie done in different aspects of mythology derived from the Christian Religion. For a very long time, seated there, we don't know this. At the outset, it looks like a gripping suspense yarn built from reality. We watch two brothers as they struggle with their father's slow decent into insanity. Frailty is real, and it's frightening, and it evokes a sickness that has been missing from true horror. I guess that's why the ending is such a let down, initially.

At first glance, the film seems to be ripping off the Shyamalan esthetic. Having stepped away from it, and having contemplated the exact outcome at every stoplight, I've come to realize why Paxton reached the ending that he has. Putting the pieces back in place, this actually works and shouldn't come as too much of a shock. It's not meant to be a jaw-dropping, "Bruce Willis is Dead" moment. The ending reveals demons hiding in our childhood, and we're too blinded by other aspects of life to accept those demons and see them for what they are.

Over all, Frailty is derived from the hyper-real world of fantasy. It's not supposed to be about mental illness, it's supposed to be about the actual act of Demon slaying. I want, and need to see this movie again. I've never been so in love with something after the fact. I have a feeling a lot of critics will dismiss it out of the gate. I did. But since that time, I've come to the conclusion that this kicks much ass. Frailty is like Cheese on a Stick. It's not the best thing you've ever eaten while eating it, but I'll be damned if you don't develop an intense craving for it after it's gone. I guess that's why they screened this for us so early in advance, and then asked us not to talk about it until its release.

There's a reason this looks like a Sam Raimi movie. Bill Paxton doesn't dispute that, and sights Raimi as a major influence. They both worked together on the earlier film A Simple Plan, and Paxton doesn't hide the fact that he has learned a lot from the man. You can see it in the shot structure, and the pacing. But Bill turns these things a little to the left, easing the film into the footsteps of a slightly different beast. Paxton knows how to use elements of horror, and stretches them into a very 'Wonder Years' type fable about growing up. His lighting technique is extremely different than Raimi's; hues invite a different world. The two children are on a level playing field. We accept the older brother's thinking, because it's morally rational. Yet, we sympathize with the younger child because Paxton brings us back into that initial thought pattern of an adolescent, when we could and did believe everything we were told.

He holds us with images that are unbelievable. At once, there is a feeling of depravity in motor function. Yet, going back, you see that those images are grounded in a very comic book-type feel in mythos. Remember those little black and white flip books filled with grotesque cartoon work that were handed out in Religious paraphernalia shops? Each one told a cautionary tale, replete with horrifying images of drug use and unwanted pregnancy. They were supposed to be from God, yet they were the creepiest thing I ever saw when I was a kid. Finding one ground into the sidewalk, even now, still gives me shivers. This film evokes that same type of queasy uneasiness.

It's TBN done-up in Gothic Horror.

Frailty is a more realist Buffy the Vampire Slayer. A man, after having one too many Hamm's Beers at the dinner table awakens to find an angel in his bowling trophy. The next morning, he starts killing 'seemingly' innocent people because someone from Heaven told him they were demons. He comes to find out his own son is a demon. Does he kill him, or let him live? That's the question asked here, but if you go back through the material, it's hinted that the father's behavior is what turned the child into the demon. After a series of horrifying events, which play like child abuse, we can see how the outcome of the 'twist' ending is justified. The point is arguable. It is known early on that the boy loses his faith in God, but when he is driven to kill, this is what makes him snap. This is why he has grown up to be a serial killer. You don't realize these things right off the bat. Ideas simmer, and that's what makes this a lasting entertainment well after you've left it behind in the theater.

This is the direction Horror needs to go at the moment. Frailty stands next to recent films Donnie Darko and The Devil's Back Bone in that they give a unique vision unlike anything we've seen before (though they graciously borrow from thrillers of the past). This type of entertainment raises questions that aren't easily answered, and I'm sure Frailty will last longer than Raimi's own recent film, Spider-Man. That's not to say we need to get rid of the visceral, 'fun' flicks. I'm just as excited about Jason X and can't wait for it to get here. I guess, my point is, alone in a room with the lights off, if I truly want to creep myself out and crawl under my air mattress, I'm going to reach for Frailty? every time. That's horror. That's new. That's what's keeping me glued to my seat, eyes squeezed tight. Jason? He's not scary. He's like a long lost friend who we cheer on in multiple-slaughter.

Congratulations, Mr. Paxton. You've taken a keen step. You're an excellent director. I look forward to seeing this film again, and whatever else might be lurking around inside that goofy head of yours.