Longlegs

It's telling in itself I suppose that I saw this in the theater about two weeks ago. At that point I was already three weeks late from its release date, and now here I am taking my time in noting down some "deep" reflections on what I had witnessed.

Sounds kinda dramatic, right? More dramatic than this film, really. Not that Longlegs is without its strengths. It's well-shot no question and I get the sense director Osgood (son of Anthony 'Norman Bates') Perkins has been improving as he's progressed through his now four-film filmography. On the writing side however, that needs some work in my view - and I believe he can get there - but overall this felt more trope-y than I was expecting. So overall - atmosphere is good. Score is solid. Anticipation-building was decent.

What didn't work was for me a noticeable lack of tension. This was supposed to be both a thriller and a horror, apparently. For me it didn't feel like either really, and it wasn't made any better by the film's namesake, played by Nicolas Cage. He was good of course, one of our best, most prolific and under-appreciated actors. However, the character, the whole albino Joker thing going on, did not work for me at all. Not that it was bad, but he did not really invoke the fear and creepiness that apparently it did for so many others.

It's good, it's entertaining and I would recommend it. Is it something special though? Perhaps in the marketing that sold this so well, but judging on the film itself, there's lot of room left for Perkins to grow, and I remain optimistic based on what worked here.