'Chained'...My Review

SPOILER ALERT!

I had the opportunity to watch 'Chained' a week or so ago and I started to write a review that was turning into a long and overly detailed deconstruction that left even me bored.  I'll spare you that and just give my overall impressions.  Frankly, I think some people may be experiencing a 'Chained' overload as of late and there have been many reviews already written that have rehashed the film a million times over.

I think the film as a whole was well done although it dragged in some places and in others seemed glossed over or edited.  I wasn't bothered by the ending as I know some were and it actually caught me by surprise.  Sure, maybe more of an explanation would have been more helpful but since Jennifer Lynch has already indicated the same, that seems to be something that would be addressed in a Director's Cut should it ever happen.

I was impressed by the cinematography and hats off to Shane Daly for his execution of creating  an atmosphere of a depressed dimly lit interior of Bob's home in sharp contrast to a sunny outside with captures of unusual cloud formations.  The inside of Bob's house reminded me of going to visit my grandparents home and how dark it always was.  It scared me.  The furniture was dark and it seemed like there was never more than a 25 watt lightbulb in the lamps.  

Equally impressive were the two young actors who played young Rabbit and older Rabbit, Evan  Bird and Eamon Farren, respectively.  Each did an admirable job and held their own opposite an experienced actor like Vincent D'Onofrio.  As the young Rabbit, Evan Bird's expressions and demeanor were spot on and never forced.  And as older Rabbit, Eamon Farren portrayed his character as a young man stripped of his youth yet with a resolve that helped him to survive unspeakable horror.  Both actors were painfully thin to the point I found alarming but lent itself to the conditions their characters lived in and as a result of.  I was secretly hoping they went to McDonald's and had a feast once the filming was complete.

Vincent D'Onofrio.  All in.  He brought it.  Stripped naked mentally and physically, it was his show.  I don't know if anyone could count on one hand any other actors who time and time again attack a role with such courage and commitment.  He WAS Bob.  When a character like Bob, who does such horrendous acts, can also make you feel some compassion is no easy feat.  Vincent successfully did both and it's to Jennifer Lynch's credit to give us a view into the inner workings of a serial killer that but for the grace of God could be you or me.  I didn't think the speech impediment was a necessary addition and at times seemed more pronounced at times than others.  In the flashbacks with young Bob, I didn't notice that he had any problem with his speech but maybe because of the trauma he went through it developed afterwards.  Still, there were other notable characterizations and expressions that more than made up for that distraction.  No one 'gives eyes' better than Vincent D'Onofrio.  That kind of emotion he shows comes from a place that actors only dream of reaching.  You can learn the ABC's of acting but to completely immerse oneself into the character and convey that feeling is something that is a gift.  Vincent D'Onofrio is a gifted actor.

All in all,  I thought it was a successful film save for a couple of things that bothered me.  I didn't think cabs had no meters or posted ID of the cabdriver.  I understand some states and/or regions operate their cabs this way but it seemed strange that the fares just threw money at Bob as if they already knew in advance how much the fare was.  And, when Sarah Fittler (a short but well acted turn by Julia Ormond) tried to use her cellphone, got no signal, yet in the background I saw telephone poles and what looked like an industrial area.  I'd also would be curious to know why Bob's brother (Jake Weber) approached Bob about getting rid of his wife and son.  Did he already know what Bob was doing?  

I was happy that Vincent was awarded 'Best Actor' at Sitges International Film Festival and that the good people of Catalonia recognized and rewarded his talent.  He deserved it for taking on a role that would scare most and not be capable of giving 100%.  We in the United States already knew that, even though he has been passed over for awards and recognition in his homeland.  It's not what he set out to do.  He just wants to act.  And we are the grateful recipients of following the career of someone who gives as much as we get.  Atta boy, Vincent.

Entertainment Focus gives 'Chained' 5 stars...

ENTERTAINMENT FOCUS
Submitted by Pip Ellwood on Mon, 08/27/2012 - 21:28

Cast: Vincent D'Onofrio, Eamon Farren, Julia Ormond

Director: Jennifer Chambers Lynch

Writer: Jennifer Chambers Lynch, Damian O'Donnell

Release Date: Wednesday 31st October 2012

Running Time: 98mins

Certificate: 18

Released By: TBC

Buy it now:

EF Rating: 

5

Tim (Eamon Farren) is kidnapped along with his mother Sarah (Julia Ormond) when he’s only 9 years old by serial killer taxi driver Bob (Vincent D’Onofrio). Taken to Bob’s secluded house, Tim is imprisoned after his mother is murdered and forced into help Bob cover up his spree of murders. As the year’s pass, the two get into a familiar routine with Bob using Tim to look after him. Chained to the wall, Tim hasn’t had freedom since he was kidnapped and Bob promises to unchain him if he sleeps with a girl and turns killer too. Will Tim manage to escape his captor or will he fall foul to the dark side that Bob is luring him to.

Jennifer Chambers Lynch’s new film Chained was one of the most anticipated films of Frightfest and it received its UK premiere earlier today. We’re pleased to say that the film didn’t disappoint as it brought to life the dark and sinister story that its synopsis promised. The film opens with the disturbing kidnapping of Tim and his mother both shocking and terrifying the audience in the process. The fear factor never lets up as Bob continues to bring women of all ages home to rape, torture and kill. There are so many disturbing moments in the film that it’s definitely not one for the faint-hearted and anyone who can’t tolerate the darker side of the horror genre should stay well clear.

Director Lynch injects her style into the film and the way she portrays and establishes the relationship between Tim and Bob is quite remarkable. Bob renames Tim to Rabbit early on in the film likening him to a caged animal. Lynch grows the relationship between the two making their interaction believable despite the horrific situation Rabbit finds himself in. She veers away from the gratuitous exploitation route that this film could easily have taken – and in the Q&A after she mentioned that the original script was more torture-porn than psychological suspense thriller. We think she made the right decision because the more subtle approach definitely struck more of a chord with us.

At the heart of Chained is two remarkable performances. Vincent D’Onofrio has made a name for himself playing oddball characters but he’s at his most terrifying here as Bob. He seems so ordinary yet at the same time is absolutely menacing. Much of Bob’s backstory comes out throughout the movie and D’Onofrio uses that material to scare the hell out of the audience. Eamon Farren on the other hand plays Rabbit/Tim in a very restrained and considered way. He reacts practically rather than emotionally to the situation he’s in. His interaction with D’Onofrio’s Bob is really powerful.

Chained is by no means an easy watch but it’s a triumph of film-making. The subject matter will certainly not be to everyone’s taste but Lynch has created a movie that will affect you long after the final reel. In the hands of a less capable director this could easily have been a very different film but Lynch controls it putting the right emphasis in the right places. As much an exploration of unspoken love as it is an unpleasant musing on the sinister side of some people, Chained is a remarkable film that captivates, engages and emotionally moves you.

THANX, MARIAN!

The London Film Review: 'Chained'

THE LONDON FILM REVIEW

Fright Fest: Chained

Posted on 01 September 2012 by Paul Risker

Chained the fifth feature from director Jennifer Chambers Lynch is a harrowing psychological thriller that begins with nine year old Tim (Evan Bird) and his mother being kidnapped by taxi driver Bob (Vincent D’Onofrio). Witnessing his mother’s murder, Tim is chained and imprisoned in Bob’s remote home, becoming known only by the name ‘Rabbit.’ The film then jumps forward where we encounter an older ‘Rabbit’, for whom slavery and murder has become a way of life. Rabbit is forced not only to help Bob bury his victims, but also collect souvenirs of the victim’s identity and keep Bob’s scrap book up-to-date. The young man eventually faces a tough moral choice: freedom if he is willing to become Bob’s protégé and follow in his murderous footsteps.

Up to now Lynch has been unable to find her feet with the critical establishment, her films not even granting her the consolation of attracting a commercial audience. Her career thus far has been underwhelming despite the creativity of her stories and the diversity of ideas. Boxing Helena, her 1993 directorial debut, received a lukewarm reception and to date her main success was 2008’s Surveillance, starring Julia Ormond and Bill Pullman. Whilst Lynch’s fortunes with the commercial audience will go unchanged; Chained not the kind of film to be a heavyweight contender at the box office, it should secure her favourable critical nods and earmark her as a director of interest. Chained is one of those films that could be seen as the dawn of a director coming to fruition. In Chained she explores themes that have been present in her other films, imprisonment, emotional and physical abuse in Boxing Helena, the crime narrative of Surveillance, and elements of horror present in both her directorial debut and later Hisss.

Watching Chained I felt that sense of privilege I occasionally encounter with a film, that feeling of being in the presence of a talented writer, director and cast. Vincent D’Onofrio delivers a mesmerizing performance as the deranged serial killer taxi driver, bringing out of his antagonist a physical ugliness, supplemented by a cruel streak that in moments is completely void of empathy. Despite my dislike for Bob, I sat wide eyed, chuckling inappropriately I confess, as I find myself in awe of what was quite simply a masterful performance. From D’Onofrio and Lynch’s collaboration emerges an intriguing serial killer, not defined simply as an ‘evil man’ but a fully realised character who possesses a psychological grounding, himself a victim. Lacking the general intelligence of his society, Bob transforms himself into a predator. He leaps to the top of the food chain, by exploiting his knowledge of human behaviour; the cornerstone of his IQ.

One of the admirable qualities of Chained was its restraint, unwilling at any point to retreat to melodrama to stimulate or entertain its audience. Much of this credit should go to Eamon Farren, whose performance is ever so precisely judged. Lacking melodramatic tendencies it is balanced ever so finely between the human instincts of fight or flight, his body a locked box of emotions wanting to break free, betrayed by his unsteady motion, sweaty pallor, nervous and wide-eyed gaze. Farren’s performance is the hook we hang on sympathy on, but it is the restraint of his performance that ensures Chained is a truly dark and gritty psychological thriller. His retreat to melodrama would have compromised the realism of his character, transposed realism for entertainment, and undermined the performance of his co-star D’Onofrio.

Chained is a film of performances, and Lynch understands this, showing herself to be an actor’s director. However, the film is not perfect, and Lynch herself knows this.  Along with her I hope she has the opportunity to deliver her director’s cut which will grant her the opportunity to rectify the film’s compromised conclusion.  I don’t hold Lynch accountable for this shortcoming. Forced to abide by a set running time, at no point did I feel the film sauntered in its build-up to its conclusion. Unfortunately Lynch runs out of time, having to omit scenes that consequently leave us with more questions than answers, and these very possibly overshadow what is one of the year’s most memorable revelations.

Undoubtedly one of the films of the year, it is an intelligent, dark, gritty psychological thriller.  I appreciate cinema that makes me feel uncomfortable, that makes me flinch and look away from the screen because of its harrowing content. I’m reminded of Stephen King’s comment that, “… good art should make you uncomfortable.” I guess Chained was good art, because it did make me uncomfortable, it challenged me by hitting a raw nerve.

For that alone, I look forward to experiencing it a second time, though hopefully as a director’s cut, which will remove a blemish on a film that came close to being near perfect.

Review by Paul Risker

DREAD CENTRAL: 'Chained' review

DREAD CENTRAL
 Reviewed by Serena Whitney
 August 31st, 2012

Been waiting for this one...Dread Central is one of the biggest sites for horror news, articles and information...

MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS!

Not since American Psycho have audiences have experienced a clever dissection of the appalling misogyny displayed in the serial killer sub-genre from a female perspective and director Jennifer Lynch (best known for her catastrophic film debutBoxing Helena and her recent comeback Surveillance) has definitely gone above and beyond to leave a lingering feeling of uneasiness long after the end credits of this deeply disturbing psychological thriller about child abuse, sadism and the emotional turmoil of capture-bonding relationships.

Lynch shows no mercy to the viewers as she unfolds the film’s most horrifying, albeit realistic chain of events minutes into the film when a mother and her young son (respectively played by Julia Ormond and Evan Bird) jump into a cab outside of a movie theatre to go home after watching a horror film. Unfortunately for the pair, the cab is driven by Bob, (Vincent D’Onofrio) deranged and seemingly emotionless serial killers whose daily routine consists of collecting taxi fares and luring defenseless women to his dank and decrypted home to savagely rape and murder.

Knowing the boy is not a threat, Bob takes the mother and son to his home, proceeds to rape and kill the mother off screen while the boy is forced to listen to his mother’s last screams of agony from the garage.

After the murder has been committed, Bob forces the boy to live with him, renames him “Rabbit,” and makes him his personal slave as he is forced to clean up Bob’s bloody messes, sit on the floor and only eat the scraps off his captor’s plate for the next decade.

As the years pass, Rabbit (now played by Eamon Farren) has now become resigned to the tragic reality of his living situation, while Bob has slowly taken on a father-like role in Rabbit’s life as he offers him untouched food, clothes, beer and makes him study large textbooks to make sure he is an educated man. Alas, all Bob knows is pain and hatred towards women, which leads to him trying to train Rabbit into being the same monster he refuses to see in his own reflection and chaos ensues.

Although Chained is guaranteed to fuel its audience with fury and queasy butterflies in their stomachs, there is no denying the electrifying performances given throughout. Vincent D’Onofrio gives his most underrated performance to date as the film’s unsettling antagonist. He is able to chill viewers with his hair-raising demeanor and an emphasized speech impediment, while also making them unwillingly empathize with his character at times through slight glimmers of humanity as it is quite apparent through sickening flashbacks that he is a monstrosity that was made, not born.

Newcomer Eamon Farren also stands out with his subdued and understated role as the film’s ostensibly frail protagonist. After watching this film, it should come as no surprise to see this up and coming actor in higher profile projects in the near future.

If it wasn’t for its unnecessary and half-assed twist ending that unfortunately affects the film in a significant way, this could have easily been Jennifer Lynch’s best film to date for Chained is full of desolation and an eerie sense of dread that is both striking and meticulous.

Chained may not be a film that garners a second viewing; however it is definitely a movie that will stick with you, no matter how many showers you take to erase the memory of it.

3 1/2 out of 5