The Void is a movie that I’ve been meaning to watch since it was released. For one reason or another, I didn’t have the time or motivation to sit down and watch it, despite the fact that I knew (from the title alone) it would be along the lines of the Lovecraft horror that I enjoy. It should come as no surprise that I enjoyed the film overall, but my bias towards the horror of this genre does not prevent me from acknowledging its various flaws.

Pros

Refreshing to see a recent film that uses practical effects like 80s horror
Practical effects are also quite good and convincing
Good makeup effects
Solid direction, lighting, and cinematography provide great shots to build the atmosphere
Climax is a spectacle

Cons

Characters are mostly either annoying or not very interesting
Acting is hit-and-miss
Sound design could have been better in some spots regarding the ‘siren’
A lot of ‘fake drama’
Plot twists don’t feel entirely earned

Plot & Thoughts

Sheriff Daniel Carter (Aaron Poole) is about to return to the dispatch station after a slow night when a young man emerges from the woods confused, injured, and fatigued having just escaped from two people who want him dead. He brings the stranger to the closest clinic, where his estranged (ex?) wife Allison (Kathleen Munroe) works as a nurse under the guidance of Dr. Richard Powell (Kenneth Welsh). The young man is docile at first but is then given a sedative when he wakes up in a violent panic. As Daniel tries to make heads or tails of the situation, all the other characters are trying to talk to him about personal issues he’d rather avoid and there appear to be people dressed in white hoods and robes gathering outside the clinic at the forest’s edge. The night gets stranger when one attacks Daniel with a knife, he hears the sound of a booming siren, and someone kills a patient.

Things gradually continue to spiral out of control at this tiny clinic in the middle of nowhere because some of the dead don’t stay dead (or stay human), and the number of gathering cultists continues to increase. In addition, the people who were after the young man from the beginning also show up at the clinic, and then things get even more dramatic. I’ll stop mentioning the plot points here, as I’ve already gone a bit further into the movie’s run-time than I usually do when it comes to describing the story. The main reason I wanted to include the fact that the two characters show up, a father (Daniel Fathers) and son (Myk Byskov), is because with them comes a ton of unnecessary drama.

Up to the point where the father and son arrived, I enjoyed the drama of the film. Horrible things are happening, but the drama that is unfolding does not feel forced or over the top. The quieter reactions of the characters allow certain scenes to settle in. There are certainly some scenes in which people are shouting, but the shouting is typically brief and more justified in the situation. When the father and son show up, however, it becomes one scene after another of unnecessary drama or shouting. It’s not entirely unjustified in certain situations, but these characters bring conflict with them that feels contrived and unnatural. The father in particular is that typical horror character who is needlessly aggressive towards everyone else beyond the point of negotiation. Even as Daniel attempts to keep the situation cool, the father just has a desire to escalate things. This created annoying false tension that took me out of the film when I watched it. It’s not that there isn’t drama for these characters to confront, it’s that the drama that these characters are creating does not need to happen and feels artificial as a result. If anything that’s my biggest gripe with The Void.

In addition to that major grievance, I have a few other complaints. First of all, the story. The plot slowly ties everything together by the end with an explanation as to why all the cultists were showing up at this one particular clinic and what the random stranger that Daniel found has to do with any of it. I don’t think the explanation that is provided, however, is really earned. Not to mention, the relationship between Daniel and his wife, and the issue that had caused a schism in their relationship was not entirely clear to me. I also wasn’t entirely sure how all the cult stuff was really tying together with certain characters or why. However, to give it the benefit of the doubt, that may have been intentional as that is also a Lovecraft thing to do.

Another issue I had was that some of the character behavior felt inconsistent or just unexpected in certain circumstances. For example, Daniel doesn’t come across as a cop. I don’t necessarily think he’s a bad actor, but I don’t think his mannerisms really fit his character’s role that well, which may be a fault of the script. In addition, most of the male characters seem to make smart, rational decisions when they’re not busy yelling at each other about nothing, but the female characters do not. This seems to only be for the sake of either progressing the plot or adding more false drama, which is a shame.

Okay. I know I just had multiple paragraphs about what I don’t like about The Void, but the truth of the matter is that I actually liked the movie. False drama and dumb characters are frequent issues in horror movies, so I’m accustomed to them. I just wish they weren’t in a movie that was so good in other respects. With that said, let’s quickly look at the good.

It’s so refreshing to see a newer horror movie akin to John Carpenter’s The Thing, An American Werewolf in London, or some other horror film from the magical era of practical effects. It’s a rare thing these days. Even though the plot is a little needlessly convenient, I’m still more than happy to watch the spectacle of The Void in action. And what a spectacle it is, as the animatronics, puppets, makeup, and practical effects are all shown in their shocking and horrific glory. The Void has some great effects early on that are impressive and disturbing, but it gets even more wild in the last act of the film when it becomes a true spectacle of special effects.

The special effects are not the only thing worth praising, though. A fair amount of credit has to be given to the direction and cinematography, which has some great creepy shots to really show off the effects in a way that not only makes them impressive-looking, but horrifying. There are some great low-angle, silhouette, and wide-angle shots that make The Void even more of a showstopper than it already is. If you’re a horror fan who appreciates the craft of film-making and the ways that horror separates from other genres in this regard, The Void is a great artifact worth seeing in the same way movies from the likes of George A. Romero, Toby Hooper, John Carpenter, Wes Craven and other directors of the ’70s and ’80s are.

TL;DR (Conclusion)

Despite a few key flaws, The Void was a fantastic horror movie that I shouldn’t have procrastinated in experiencing for myself. The special effects, lighting, direction, cinematography, and art style all come together to create a definitive Lovecraft experience on film that is truly unlike most other modern movies. The Void will stick with me for a while.

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