The Unborn

The classic film opening - bit of music, bit of scenery from lots of angles, big shots of the city and then blamo we have Casey jogging along a bridge, one snowy morning in a park (twasn’t really a ‘blamo’ moment tbh). She sees a glove lying on the path and being easily distracted she decides to pick it up. Behind her a sickly looking child stares at her wearing only one glove. She turns away and sees a bulldog wearing a plain white mask over its ...
...describing to her friend over the phone as she baby-sits this creepy little boy and his sister. The boy gets out of bed in the night and when she goes looking for him, he’s in his baby sister’s room making her stare into a mirror, repeating over and over “Jumby wants to be born now.” Casey disturbs him and it smacks her up (changes her pitch up).


Disturbed Casey is having lots of problems lately. She hallucinates weird things ... more

The classic film opening - bit of music, bit of scenery from lots of angles, big shots of the city and then blamo we have Casey jogging along a bridge, one snowy morning in a park (twasn’t really a ‘blamo’ moment tbh). She sees a glove lying on the path and being easily distracted she decides to pick it up. Behind her a sickly looking child stares at her wearing only one glove. She turns away and sees a bulldog wearing a plain white mask over its face and follows it into the woods where she finds a jar with a foetus inside.

This is all a dream she’s had that she’s describing to her friend over the phone as she baby-sits this creepy little boy and his sister. The boy gets out of bed in the night and when she goes looking for him, he’s in his baby sister’s room making her stare into a mirror, repeating over and over “Jumby wants to be born now.” Casey disturbs him and it smacks her up (changes her pitch up).

Disturbed Casey is having lots of problems lately. She hallucinates weird things and her bathroom mirror seems to be vibrating all the time. She stares to black out in class and all she sees written everywhere is “Jumby wants to be born now”. What’s even stranger is that one of her eyes is also changing colour from brown to bright blue. The figure of the little boy in her dream occurs time and time again along with freaky masked dogs.

She thinks something is after her and is terrified she may be going crazy like her mother did. She starts to discover more about her own history and that of her mother. A long lost grandmother who escaped Auswitz knows more than she’s letting on, it turns out her eye condition only occurs in twins and yet she doesn’t have a twin and there’s more to her mother’s madness than she knows of. She enlists the help of the Book of Mirrors a Cabbalist Jewish text and a Jewish rabbi (Gary Oldman) to try and relieve her of this torture.

What I thought

Not long ago I watched a reviewed Cloverfield in which I commented on the attractiveness of Odette Yustman who starred in it. Well whilst reading about Cloverfield I noticed that she was also in this film or “The film with the ass poster” as I termed it from the time I first saw the posters, so I searched about and yup I’d already bought it in my obsessive compulsive way and here we are.

And you know what? Despite all the heavy criticism of this film, the aggregate score of 12% on Rotten Tomatoes and the fact that it seemed to solely publicise itself on the basis of the lead actress having a fine ass, I thought this film was actually good. Surprisingly so. I expected to dislike, hell, I almost wanted to dislike it but nope I thought it was well worth the watch.

Why? Well first of all this film from the outset in the dream sequence had some dark, disturbing and original imagery that was fresh and scary. The masked dogs freaked me out. That was weird. There’s a dog with an upside down head in here and some old dude’s body contorts in all directions at one point. Okay, there were quite a few scenes were all we saw were flashes of the wee ghost kid that are quite clichéd for horror films but the dogs and foetuses etc. were original and were scary. I have to say I jumped more than once and I think to an extent this film delivers on the horror front and not many modern horror films do unless it’s gore and to be honest I don’t find gore scary.

Second major advantage is the Jewish context was fresh. It’s almost like every horror film with demons and ghosts is being funded by the Catholic Church because it’s always a priest to the rescue. Which of those donation envelopes that you get to give in chapel are for the Hollywood propaganda collection? The green ones? I don’t mean to criticise Catholicism, I want to keep my review short but you get sick of it over and over again in films. Gary Oldman was probably not the best choice for a rabbi though. I don’t think I’ve ever knowingly met a Jew in my life, but I wouldn’t picture one as Gary Oldman. They shoulda went with a stereotype. Also it has to be said he didn’t act brilliantly either.

The Jewish thing also led back to Auswitz and weird Nazi Occultism and I’ve said it time and time again that Nazis are scary and there’s potential for a really scary horror film with Nazis. This wasn’t it but it had an interesting idea for a story, that drew from the Nazi’s experiments.

Sadly this film isn’t all up, up, up. It has its drawbacks. The story is predictable and clichéd and the finale was disappointing. Although the imagery and concept is unique, it’s executed in the same old way. Flashes of the scary ghost child from a distance and in nightmares. The wise old person who lives in a home, who’s very friendly at first but who turns nasty when she finds out what they’ve come to talk about only to call them back later and tell them everything is such a cliché it’s horrible and should never be allowed in a film again.

Odette Yustman is very hot and she sold more than a few cinema tickets based on that ass poster but she’s not a great actress. She just fops about and is a bit pathetic. She believes she killed her twin brother in the womb and gets very upset about it and it just seems so fake. She’s basically exploited for her attractiveness and needs to learn how to act a bit better.

As for Gary Oldman, how disappointing. He’s one of the reasons why I bought this DVD as I believe him to be a tremendous actor and one of my all time favourites but he was seriously bad in this film. I know I say I liked this film but Gary Oldman lowered himself for this role and shouldn’t have wasted his time. He doesn’t look or act like a rabbi and he doesn’t look or act like he really cares for the role to be honest. It’s like he himself has decided to spare a bit of time as himself to be in the film. He’s not going to act though, just read the script as he is. Casey also has this boyfriend in the film who was such a bad actor I’m not going to bother to name drop. Why did he always look angry?

Idris Elba of The Wire and Rocknrolla also has a role in this film as an Episcopalian minister. He’s alright. Nothing fantastic.

The little scary kid who Casey is babysitting has a really weird shaped head, as does Casey in the flashback to when she’s a little girl. I know this guy with such a shaped head. Heads.

The film is written and directed by David S. Goyer who also wrote for the last two big Batman films but also the horrendous Jumper and just as his writing career as its troughs and peaks so does the story for this film but directing wise he done a solid job. Some of the scary scenes were nicely put together and Casey’s disturbing episode in the bathroom was brilliant.

Also produced by Michael Bay. Does that make you care? Didn't make me care.

Of Importance

The reason you’re having weird dreams may be either:
a) you’re being haunted by a Jewish Demon; or
b) “you’ve got a diseased vagina” - the possibility given by Romy, Casey’s friend

Gary Oldman has a big stupid horn in this film.

Apparently it’s bad luck for a baby to see its reflection before it’s one year old.

The doctor asks her “Are you familiar with the term genetic moniasism (or something?)” Who the hell would be?

When Casey asks the old woman why all this stuff is happening to her now and not years ago the old woman gives some unsatisfactory answer I can’t remember but let’s face it the real answer is because you look good now and if the story had you any younger all those promo posters with you in front of the mirror woulda just been creepy.

Films with stories like this always revolve around excessively rich people which annoys me. It would not only be more realistic and have a wider appeal if it was more down to earth but it would give it a little more originality.

Casey stops to pick up a glove, in her dream and real life. How clean must her city be that the sight of a glove on the ground is so mind boggling that she has to pick it up and look at it?

My cheek was sticky whilst watching this film. I think it was honey.

Who I’d punch

Gary Oldman, to make him get his ass back into gear and in real films.

Trailer

http://www.theunbornmovie.net/

Overall

Despite its tainted acting and its occasional slips into clichés this is not a bad modern horror film to watch this Hallowe’en. It has some original and very haunting imagery that really impressed me and it will make you jump. It has a freshness to it in that despite a few clichés it runs a different track to every other horror film. The ending disappoints though and though I recommend it to some extent don’t get you hopes up too much.

Written by Phelim McC. Don't steal it, or I will violate you 

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