13 Days of First-Time Frights: Jennifer's Body

13 Days of First-Time Frights is a series of reviews for October 2019 where Douglas Laman, in the spirit of Halloween, watches and writes about thirteen horror movies he's never seen before. These reviews will be posted each Tuesday and Thursday as well as the last three Wednesdays of October 2019.

Entry #5: Jennifer's Body

When it comes to acclaimed horror movies getting initially negative reviews, well, to quote tom Jones, "It's not unusual." Films like George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead or Tobe Hooper's Texas Chain Saw Massacre had plenty of notable detractors upon their very first theatrical releases before getting properly reevaluated in the years afterwards. What's especially strange about Jennifer's Body is how the initial reviews didn't just critique the film, they saw it as a vehicle to attack the films writer (Diablo Cody) and to ogle the films star (Megan Fox). As has been noted in a number of excellent pieces by now, the majority of negative Jennifer's Body reviews back in 2009 were all kinds of gross and misogynistic. It's utterly repulsive to see all these reviews passing for actual film criticism, though, thankfully, a broader array of voices have made themselves heard on the internet and ensured that Jennifer's Body is getting the re-evaluation it deserves.

Destroyer Channels Green Room and Mikey & Nicky In Its Exquisitely Crafted Dark Tone

"We may be through with the past, but the past is not through with us", so goes one of the most memorable lines from Magnolia and Destroyer is a crime thriller about a human being whose present-day circumstances are tormented by the past. Such a set-up, unsurprisingly, results in a grim movie that has little time for levity or hope, this is a bleak examination of a person not looking for redemption so much as a way to make the emotional pain stop, even for a moment. Such a pervasively mirthless affair won't be to everyone's liking, but me? I absolutely adored Destroyer, it's an absorbing movie that executes its dark tone with exquisite filmmaking that echoes the harrowing rawness found in Elaine May's Mikey & Nicky or Jeremy Saulnier's Green Room.