FrightFest review – Lesions
Houston (Alexander McPherson) and Lise (Elsa Ames) are getting close to divorce when Houston stumbles carrying off a box of his stuff – and a hospital trip gives him a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis (a cause is lesions on the brain) … which prompts a reassessment of the couple’s situation as Lise dutifully becomes Houston’s primary carer as they move to a relative’s large, isolated house to try all manner of treatments (the ice baths recommended by an online guru) to stave off the inevitable advance of the debilitating condition.
All this is played as a low-key family drama, with more significant looks than to-the-point dialogue, with a slightly ominous angle … the country retreat is plainly a horror movie locale and a doctor who recommends an experimental treatment is hesitant, haunted by something bloody which happens in an elliptical prologue. Then there’s a montage of what looks like highlights of the next seven Strangers movies as a cadre of masked, silent home invaders murder a lot of innocent people – while playing to a set of hard-to-parse rules. One killer comes across a guy with a shotgun, so there’s a gap in the gang … and New Guy (Cody Carville) meets in a diner with the team – the Alpha (John Wilkins III), Blue (Audrey Deitz), the Brute (Jeremy Fogt) and Klepto (Hunter Gehman) – bringing files on prospective victims, including Lise, who has posted something bland on social media which has caught the apprentice psycho’s eye. Lise and Houston struggle – writer-director Codey S. Wilson was himself diagnosed with MS, and this section of the film is obviously based on personal observation – with practicalities, while Houston is all too conscious that if he weren’t sick his wife would be long gone by now and has the beginnings of sight loss which sometimes make his plight look hazily beautiful. That radical treatment also seems to have gruesome body horror side-effects. Then the killer crew show up – and things do not go the way anyone expected.
Lesions is a confident, impressive picture which isn’t afraid to take some very big swings … the heart sinks when we get to a standard torture porn situation as Lise is duct-taped to Houston’s just-delivered wheelchair, but the knife-wielding Blue is struck by the woman’s rock ‘n’ roll shirt and launches into a fantasy dance number complete with pounding soundtrack and disco lighting. Picking up from the subjective hallucinatory visions Houston has been suffering, Lesions breaks with the conventions of stalk-and-slash-around-the-mansion and takes unexpected plot and stylistic turns. The killers can’t quite keep to their vow of silence but do most of their murderousness in expressive mime – Deitz is the stand-out, with blue hair and sinewy hands, playing a character with her whole body while wearing a blank white mask. They are matched by McPherson, who unusually does double duty as key make-up designer, when the side effects of the treatment give Houston unexpected powers and abilities beyond mortal men without actually curing him. Sympathies are very finely balanced, with our heroes not being the pushovers the psychos presumably take them for. Lise mentions early that she’s proficient with power tools and gardening equipment thanks to being brought up in a hardware store, which gives her an edge – and some edged weapons – when she gets free. And Houston transforms into something like a franchise character.
It’s almost a surprise to find a home invasion/psycho picture which isn’t ‘rough around the edges’. This is extremely well-wrought – it looks terrific, is paced brilliantly, embraces slasher forms without too much knowing, has sensitive performances, and makes imaginative use of its thematic meat. Highly recommended.
Discussion
No comments yet.