Horror Movie Weekly Ep. 085: Rabid (2019)

Hey Guys – Thanks for the discussion on ‘Rabid’ last week! I enjoyed the 2019 version from the Soska Sisters. I think the best reason to remake a movie is to communicate the story in a new voice. The Soska Sisters added things of interest to women that the simplistic (yet effective) 1977 Cronenberg movie lacks. I like that. I’m excited to see what the Soskas direct next.

I saw ‘Savageland’ this week. I had never heard of it until listening to last week’s episode. I enjoy found footage movies. I’m a big fan of ‘Lake Mungo,’ ‘[REC],’ and a couple of others.

‘Savageland’ maintains a good, creepy mood, though I think it has a few problems. The main one is it’s unnecessarily long for the story it tells. Unfortunately, the movie leans into this problem by hitting its “horror climax” when the first evil-looking face is revealed in one of the photos, about twenty minutes in.

I thought this was an interesting idea. Perhaps it was an idea in search of a different medium. It would have been cooler, I think, as a stage play/courtroom trial of Carlos Olivares, where the audience listens to increasingly weird testimony and is shown the photos as “exhibits” in the case, climaxing in the sentencing. It also could have worked as a TV episode of something like ‘The X-Files’ where the investigator/main characters are on location, yet have to deal with societal tension regarding immigration on top of trying to solve the mysterious disappearances.

The filmmakers totally missed the boat with what happens to Carlos Olivares after the sentencing. I realize this is an ultra-low-budget production, yet how hard would it have been to have ONE of the long-winded commentators at least present a “crazy supernatural theory” that would have clicked with the ending, so at least the audience can put together what happened, even if the characters remain clueless.

Haha also… camera? Are we supposed to believe Carlos was snapping photos instead of using a cel phone to film what was going on… AND MAYBE CALL FOR HELP? They should have had an interviewed character give a logical thought on why Carlos refused to put down the camera–or, at the very least, point out it was odd he never bothered to pick up a phone from one of the many bodies–so I didn’t feel like I was losing my mind asking myself “why?”

I like horror (naturally!), and it’s easy for me to go into “auto-pilot” (I have ADHD-I), and accept whatever is happening on screen for the sake of getting to the thrills/scares, yet the added commentary towards the end where a couple of the more ignorant characters maintain the idea of Carlos’s guilt basically because of his status as an illegal immigrant was, frankly, offensive. What was offensive about it was not that those characters could think that; it was offering that scene in the conclusion part of the “found footage.” It felt like the filmmakers were offering it to me as a possible explanation. More skillful (socially aware?) filmmakers would have simply put this comment earlier in the film, when the audience knows next-to-nothing about what happened in the town.

Still-the movie has its moments. Inspired touches like “Grace is gone,” and the mother who lives in another town tragically saying she was hoping to make up for lost time to her daughter were horror-movie gold. They should have kept those, and thrown out half of everything else.

BTW, I have to hand it to Jay of the Dead for the opening music on this podcast. It’s great. Whenever I hear it, it fires me up for the the show.

Anyways, thanks so much for making this show weekly(!) I have a podcast of my own now, and I sincerely appreciate the work all three of you put into it.

Looking forward to next week’s episode!

Best,
VV