Reviews

Seattle-set Malignant sees director James Wan letting loose with a movie defined by a completely outrageous finale

Malignant (2021 | USA | 111 minutes | James Wan)

A horror film that quite literally goes from 0 to 60, Malignant flaunts reason or subtlety with such audacious confidence that it boggles the mind.

It is also amazing.  

To review a movie like Malignant requires biting your tongue so hard it starts to bleed. It is an experience that is defined so thoroughly by its final act that it is hard to address what makes it so great without thoroughly ruining the shock and surprise of how completely bonkers it all becomes. Yet being kept in the dark about how utterly unhinged it becomes in the last half hour ensures Malignant is one of the most unforgettable films you’ll see this year. 

The story and elements that can be discussed may sound like a more straightforward, conventional horror film. Don’t let that deceive you, this film is a Trojan Horse of a story that completely upends itself in the most glorious fashion possible. It centers around Madison (Annabelle Wallis), a Seattle woman struggling to have a child. She has an abusive and cruel boyfriend who physically harms her in the opening minutes by shoving her into a wall. 

Don’t worry about getting too attached to him, he will be the recipient of what is almost divine retribution when a shadowy figure appears to break into the couple’s home. The figure seems to be human, though has such super strength that it almost could be supernatural. The downside to this figure appearing is that Madison is also injured and tragically loses her child. She will then be left with having to piece together what the shadowy figure is and why she keeps having visions of it killing others. To complicate matters, a bumbling duo of police officers begin to investigate and suspect that Madison herself may in fact be somehow involved with the gruesome murders. 

Wan plays with the idea that Madison’s perspective is an unreliable one, a staple of most horror films that seek to wrongfoot the audience and unnerve them as more details come to light. Her horrifying visions are all coming true, though other details seemingly go blank from her mind. An abduction and subsequent imprisonment of a woman who leads one of Seattle’s Underground Tours initially seems to be somewhat jarringly disconnected from the main story. However, Wan waits until just right moment to cause maximum, Earth shaking impact by revealing how the pieces all fit together. 

Wan has more than proven himself as a horror director, having worked on multiple large franchises including the more recent The Conjuring series, and my oh my does he cash in on that experience here. This is the type of film that feels like there was absolutely no studio notes or interference, leaving for a wholly untouched vision of completely committed storytelling. Many of the visual sequences, including an extended shot looking down on Madison as she is running through her house trying to escape the shadowy figure, are engaging and well-directed. The music in this scene is somewhat off putting, even silly in tone. Scenes like this prolong tension; and the mix of subtlety and absurdity makes for quite a bizarre cocktail. Not a bad one, just strange to the taste. 

One example is a frequent use of what sounded like an electronic cover of the Pixies “Where Is My Mind”, though it never goes on for too long. The choice feels meant to almost tease the audience, sounding just close enough to the original but not quite getting all the way there. As the film goes on, the sense that Wan is messing with us only becomes more and more prevalent. There are cliche moments of uncovering video tapes that show the origins of the shadowy figure, who keeps uttering the creepy phrase “time to cut out the cancer.” What that phrase means and how it will come into play is revealed in one such tape. The revelation seems inauspicious as first, but as the camera peeks behind a character it reveals information that will completely change the entire course of the film with no going back. 

Whether this moment works for you will determine whether you enjoy the film as it informs everything the story has shown you prior. It provides a backward-looking answer to some of the floating questions while also raising countless others. It almost feels like a punchline of a development, though it landed with such an outrageous crash that I couldn’t help but be impressed by the audacity. Everything that follows it is some of the most fun and bananas sequences I’ve seen in a film this year. It made me feel like my head was going to explode while also putting my mind at ease once it settled into what it really wanted to be. It is full speed ahead and Wan is the maniac in the driver’s seat taking us off the cliff. 

The narrative momentum up until this point of no return didn’t always keep up a compelling pace, though that all flies out the window and is soon left blissfully behind. In particular, the elements of body horror that end up becoming the core of the film are some of the most well-executed aspects of the whole affair. It is hard to fully recommend a film like Malignant to someone without about fifty different disclaimers, though such disclaimers would ruin the fun. Thus, recommend it I shall with a simple statement: this film is an absolutely absurd and anarchic joy.   

Rating: 4 out of 5.

Malignant is in theaters and on HBO Max September 10.