30 NIGHTS OF NIGHT, Night 3: THE HARVEST (2013)

John McNaughton doesn't make films so often anymore, so any release of his is usually worth more than a cursory glance, especially since he's one of those directors like Alan Parker or James Mangold who refuse to be pigeonholed into one genre.  He started with possibly the most brutal serial killer film ever made (Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer), went on to make a wacky splatter comedy in which an alien occupies human bodies and makes their heads explode (The Borrower), then followed with a dark comedy (Mad Dog and Glory) and a twisty-turny noir thriller (Wild Things).  Other than some selected TV work, that's about it.

With The Harvest he returns to horror, but not the ruthless terror of Henry or the goofiness of The Borrower; rather, he shoots for a more sentimental, tragic horror.  It is a story about two monsters who have become monsters out of necessity.  It should be no surprise that one of them is played by Michael Shannon, who is able to exude a single-minded amoral determination and utter helplessness at the same time.

Shannon is Richard and Samantha Morton is his wife Katherine.  She is a doctor and he has quit his job to spend more time with their son Andy (Charlie Tahan), who is ailing of an unspecified but debilitating disease which renders him barely able to walk.  It's getting worse.

Meanwhile, Maryann (Natasha Calis, of Possession) moves in next door with her grandparents and swiftly befriends Andy.  Trouble is that his parents--mostly Katherine--are suspicious about letting anyone get too close to Andy, and it becomes apparent that they're hiding something.

The first half of the film is brilliant.  The relationship between the two kids is charming and believable.  Morton takes a cue from Bette Davis and plays Katherine as a woman who might seem irrational and shrewish, but is hiding a desperation.  Shannon is her complement, a man who is sincerely devoted to his son but sadly doubtful that his efforts will save him.  There's a great Hitchcock-like sequence in which Maryann tries to sneak Andy out for a game of catch, the ending of which is somehow both surprising and inevitable.

Once the entire plot is revealed, the movie loses its way, especially when Morton stops being the overprotective mother and becomes a typical psychopath.  The transition is not quite as seamless as it should be.  Even though the movie never becomes nihilistic, it leaves us wishing it had gone a more thoughtful route.  It may have made a more effective one-hour TV episode than a full-length movie, but it's still worth a look for its two likable leads, and for Shannon.

** 1/2 out of ****

30 NIGHTS OF NIGHT, Night 2: AREA 51 (2015)

I was really hoping Oren Peli wouldn't be a one-trick pony, but Area 51, the director's second feature after his explosive Paranormal Activity, is so similar to that previous film that it barely has any real reason for existence.  It's skillfully made and entertaining, but it hits too many of the same notes.

The basic premise is the same: overly curious people tread where they shouldn't, gravely overestimate their intelligence, and film themselves facing the consequences.  This time instead of a haunting, it's possible alien activity and government conspiracies.  When Reid (Reid Warner) disappears from a party one night and reappears a few hours later without any idea where he's been, he and his two buddies launch an investigation into the titular government facility, leading up to an attempted break-in during which the three friends find more than they bargained for.

Because Peli is a good filmmaker, much of the break-in itself and its aftermath are appropriately tense, with a few well-placed surprises.  But the film doesn't have the slow-burn build to inevitability that Paranormal had, and it doesn't help that none of the three male protagonists is all that likable.  The ending does have one very well-executed first-person shot that I admittedly hadn't seen before, but where the closing scene of Paranormal still resonates even now, this one barely buzzes.

** 1/2 out of ****

30 NIGHTS OF NIGHT, Night 1: THE NIGHTMARE (2015)

The Nightmare is both a documentary and a horror film.  That double-identity is difficult to pull off, and many have tried.  I've grown tired of "true story" horror films which try to have their cake and eat it too, assuring the audience of their veracity while fudging real events to make them spookier (see The Exorcism of Emily Rose, Deliver Us from Evil, The Conjuring, The Amityville Horror).

The Nightmare does not do that.  It's not about scary ghosts but scary experiences.  Its people are haunted not by spirits but by something in their own minds that is beyond their understanding.

We meet eight people who suffer from sleep paralysis.  Each has had, with varying frequency, crippling vivid nightmares in which he or she finds himself or herself unable to move as frightening things happen around them.  They are as real as real life, so real that some have trouble telling the difference.

Director Rodney Ascher portrays each nightmare in gut-wrenching first person.  As in his first film, the Shining conspiracy-fan-theory exploration Room 237, there is no explicit directorial voice.  Every word we hear (save for some reenactments) comes from the dreamers.  We experience each dream as it is being narrated to us by its victim.  On a conventional level, it's scary, but the sincerity of the narrator makes it all the more brutal.

I can imagine a decent fictional horror film based around this affliction.  In fact, there was one: Insidious, which is cited by one of the film's subjects as a fairly accurate depiction of the disorder.  It's a naturally terrifying concept.  But Ascher goes a few steps further than merely depicting the subjects' nightmares; he explores the effect the nightmares have on their lives. The questions they raise.  The conclusions they lead to.  The struggles they cause.

I don't know what kind of research has been done on sleep paralysis.  Neither do the afflicted.  They're left to figure it out for themselves.  Most have been told by family and friends that they are "just bad dreams," and nothing to worry about, echoing common unenlightened assumptions about mental illnesses.  We notice that many of the images and sensations in these dreams are consistent among sufferers.  The tall, thin shadow men.  The tingling sensation in their nerves.  The dull, ambient voices.  The small black creature on their chest which could be seen as a cat (an image which dates back at least as far as 1787, in Henry Fuseli's painting "The Nightmare").

But then there are the differences.  Some are overtly threatening, like a mysterious phone call in which an attacker demands to be let into the house.  Others are more ambiguous.  One subject reports a childhood dream in which he sees a bright light and is kidnapped by two tall thin figures.  As an adult, he watches the film Communion and discovers that Whitley Streiber's version of the conventional alien figure looks very similar.  Maybe those who purport to have been abducted by aliens are simply misinterpreting a case of sleep paralysis?  Maybe.

Ascher wisely doesn't provide an answer.  He stays with his eight subjects as they make sense of their own situation.  Some are inspired, as one woman finds her faith when reciting the name "Jesus" brings her out of her dream.  Some feel doomed, as one man is convinced that he will one day die in his sleep because of his paralysis.  He falls asleep every night thinking it might be the night.  And another takes some comfort when she first learns of the concept of sleep paralysis and discovers she's not the only one who suffers from it.  Or as she puts it, quite appropriately, "It's a thing!"

**** out of ****