I felt obligated to write about this movie. It's the only movie I previewed that I didn't later write about. I also didn't see this movie in theatres because I was expecting disappointment.
This poster makes no sense.
What the hell did I just watch?
This isn't a horror movie. Who ever decided to market this movie as a horror movie is out of their goddamn mind. For every joke about film executives doing buttloads of cocaine, the marketing department for Legendary Pictures are probably doing several lines a day. If this movie is Del Toro's "horror masterpiece" then Jurassic World was a documentary masterpiece.
This movie is kind of a thriller, murder mystery, ghosts for some reason, thing. The ghosts are never a threat (I don't care if this is a spoiler but it's not really even a spoiler). I have a soft spot for B-movies but this doesn't even try that vibe so I'm just left confused. The movie is a suspense/thriller despite there being no mystery. We know who the killer (killers) are from the start and we even know Son of Anarchy is going to try to pull off some sort of The Shining rescue. Why even did anything happen?
This movie is about an heiress named Edith, who has a rich father, who another young dude named Thomas Sharpe (Loki from Avengers) is trying to gain his favor to buy some sort of digging machine, and another doctor who is in love with her (dude from Pacific Rim) is there but kinda the guy who figures shit out sorta. Eventually, Loki kills Edith's father, or at least you think so, and doctor guy investigates, while Edith marries Loki in one of the strangest time skips I've ever seen and moves to Crimson Peak.
And sister of Loki is here too, and her name is....hold on I'm checking IMDB.
I often complain about movies moving to fast, but this movie dragged on forever. The protagonist doesn't reach Crimson Peak until 40 minutes into the movie and....it's just a mansion. Why no mountain? Is the mansion a mountain?* Everything takes sooooo long to set up that any sense of horror or tension disappears out of boredom.
*My jokes about this movie being "Blood Mountain" are totally true. I just didn't expect "Peak" to be THAT metaphor. I would say it's clever if it wasn't so absurdly stupid.*
The characters are dumb as hell. Edith has several opportunities to escape Crimson Peak and doesn't because she's poisoned and snow I guess? The nearest people are referenced to be 5 miles away. FIVE. Yeah, I'm not buying it. There are REAL life stories of people making super long treks with very little health. Come on. "I'm trying really hard at this American accent" guy does help her out in the end...for like 3 seconds before getting shanked. He really does pull off The Shining rescue only he isn't killed (spoiler for 40 year old movie).
The twists for a suspense/thriller movie are pretty damn important yet the twists in this movie you can see coming from a mile away.
Spoiler section, highlight to read:
Turns out Loki is in an incestuous relationship with his sister because ew. Their mother was evil though because of course. Loki marries rich ladies, takes their money, and then kills them...several of them which makes me wonder why nobody has investigated this. These are rich people. It's not like they are murdering vagrants.
Loki has a change of heart on Edith though and tries to stop his sister from killing her but is killed in the process. Edith is helped out by the ghost of one of the former brides which was foreshadowed only by a newspaper clipping and why are there ghosts in this movie? For a movie that says "Ghosts are real. This much I know" TWICE, like it's the message of the movie, the ghosts are barely in it and don't really do anything.
End spoiler section.
One thing the movie does well is its cinematography. Every shot looks fantastic. Del Toro seemed to put his unique monster designs into designing the mansion since there are no monsters (and the ghosts are just generic black bones zombies with squiggly lines). It's kinda weird that the mansion looks evil though because this isn't a haunted house story. It's just a place where evil people live. Is there some sort of evil architect that evil people can hire to build their evil homes? And for all the murdered rich ladies, why is the mansion so shoddy? How many heiresses must one marry then murder to fix a hole in the roof?
Ever watch a movie and feel like it went through 14 re-writes? Yeah. That is Crimson Peak. It shouldn't come as a surprise since the movie was in and out of development for a decade. The movies confused tone and cliche as hell plot didn't leave me thinking this is a bad movie, but instead committed a far worse crime. It was boring, which made this post incredibly hard to write.
Oh...and for a Del Toro movie, WHERE THE HELL WAS RON PEARLMAN?
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The twists for a suspense/thriller movie are pretty damn important yet the twists in this movie you can see coming from a mile away.
Spoiler section, highlight to read:
Turns out Loki is in an incestuous relationship with his sister because ew. Their mother was evil though because of course. Loki marries rich ladies, takes their money, and then kills them...several of them which makes me wonder why nobody has investigated this. These are rich people. It's not like they are murdering vagrants.
Loki has a change of heart on Edith though and tries to stop his sister from killing her but is killed in the process. Edith is helped out by the ghost of one of the former brides which was foreshadowed only by a newspaper clipping and why are there ghosts in this movie? For a movie that says "Ghosts are real. This much I know" TWICE, like it's the message of the movie, the ghosts are barely in it and don't really do anything.
End spoiler section.
A ghost played the piano....I don't remember why.
One thing the movie does well is its cinematography. Every shot looks fantastic. Del Toro seemed to put his unique monster designs into designing the mansion since there are no monsters (and the ghosts are just generic black bones zombies with squiggly lines). It's kinda weird that the mansion looks evil though because this isn't a haunted house story. It's just a place where evil people live. Is there some sort of evil architect that evil people can hire to build their evil homes? And for all the murdered rich ladies, why is the mansion so shoddy? How many heiresses must one marry then murder to fix a hole in the roof?
Ever watch a movie and feel like it went through 14 re-writes? Yeah. That is Crimson Peak. It shouldn't come as a surprise since the movie was in and out of development for a decade. The movies confused tone and cliche as hell plot didn't leave me thinking this is a bad movie, but instead committed a far worse crime. It was boring, which made this post incredibly hard to write.
Doctor, guy from Green Street Hooligans.
Oh...and for a Del Toro movie, WHERE THE HELL WAS RON PEARLMAN?
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