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It's
also worth noting that the forest that this film's story revolves
around is an actual place in which actual people continue to commit
actual suicide. Now maybe I'm uptight, but it does seem morally
dubious to then use the source of an ongoing series of tragedies and
turn it into a trashy, piece of shit movie. I mean, it seems that
every other day some nutless cock-womble is heading into their
school and shooting the living fuck out of everyone. If somebody then
took one of those events, cast Bruce Willis as the headmaster, and
turned it into his latest crappy action film, then wouldn't people be
pissed off about that? And obviously with 'that' I mean because it'd be
insensitive and not because most of Bruce Willis's recent films have
been as wank as he is bald. Nor does it help that I've actually
seen a short documentary on this forest by the online investigative
magazine Vice. Interestingly, this would be the same documentary that
I suspect the filmmakers here will
have seen due to the fact that when we first get our tour of the
forest they've essentially gone and remade it. Although having said
that, I don't remember a bit in the documentary in which it's
explained that the forest itself can send people mad enough to kill
themselves. If that's the case then I can't help but wish that this
film had saved me ninety minutes of my life being going into the
fucking forest for a hike itself.
Oh,
and in reality, the actual forest ranger seemed to be a quiet and
humble man whereas here he's like the Japanese version of Jurassic
Park's Robert Muldoon. Except
whereas Muldoon was an expert on Raptors, this guy has hardened
himself to the conveyor belt of horror cliches that The
Forest will subject you to.
Have you seen such films as Don't Look Now, The Blair Which
Project, and literally any
Japanese horror to feature one of those creepy little schoolgirls with long
dark hair? You know the ones I mean.. they're in films like Ringu
and kind of remind me of an early-1990's Bjork with
a really bad hangover. You have seen all of those things? Oh.. well
unless you were hoping to see their key moments incompetently remade
in a film that's about as scary as being at the top of the stairs
when receiving a death threat from Stephen Hawking, then maybe you
should give The Forest a
miss. Particularly when any tension within the film is totally
under-mined by the ranger who tells Dormer to remember that
everything she sees is completely in her own head. Now, this film
isn't even remotely scary as it is, but it's even less so when we
already know that we're not seeing a woman subjected to demons but
one that's simply gotten lost and had a dicky-fit. You know that
moment when you try to pull a t-shirt and a jumper off at the same time
but they get stuck around your head and you irrationally panic for a second. Well,
essentially, that's just what happens to Dormer's character here but with
the whole thing being dragged out for an hour and a half.
However
lets assume that you do suffer from some sort Memento-like
shit-brain and forget about the vice documentary, all of the horror
films that have been ripped off, and the park ranger's advice.. is it
possible that you might find this film scary? Well, if you find
yourself with an irrational fear of heavily signposted jump-scares
then maybe. There was a bit where the woman was running through the
trees before falling down a hole in the ground that might shock you,
but having had it happen to me the night before it just made me want
to play Minecraft. It
also seems to rely a lot on having ghosts turn up, with almost every
single one of them looking like either a Japanese woman that's
dressed up as Peter Stringfellow or Peter Stringfellow on his way out
to a particularly racist fancy dress party. If you'd hooked me up to
some sort of heart machine then you'd see that my pulse didn't change
at all throughout, with the exception of when the closing credits
suggested the movie was over and I got a bit excited to leave. Although it
probably doesn't help that the key threat of the film was announced
near the start with a character stating that “the forest will
make you see things that make you want to die”. To which I thought
“I'm a terminally single twenty-seven year old that lives with
his parents because I'm struggling to get anything better than my
currently shit job. If all that forest can do is make me want to die
than I may as well have stayed at fucking home”.
The
other problem that this crappy movie has is that it literally has
piss-all to say about anything. You know how when a duck is swimming
in a pond all we can see is it floating merrily along, but beneath the
water its little legs are paddling away? Well take another horror
film like The Babadook for
example. Put simply, The Babadook is all about an evil demon that's haunting a
mother and child, but like the swimming duck the real work is being
done below the surface. It's rife with ambiguity and double-meaning
allowing multiple, widely different interpretations of the events.
Plus it has a brilliant message about how to cope with various
anxieties, depressions, and stresses. If The Babadook was
a swimming duck then it'd be the Oscar Pistorius of the bird-world
due to the efficiency of it's super-enhanced feet. By contrast, The
Forest has literally no
underlying message behind its superficial and boring story.
Literally the only subtext I can find for the film is 'don't bother
helping your dull fucking family' and trust me, I don't need a film to
convince me of that. It does attempt to treat us to some
tragic backstory that might add a little weight to things but despite being a
fairly simple addition to the movie, the filmmakers still manage to
fuck it up. Therefore if The Forest was
a duck, not only is it not bothering to paddle at all but it'd be the
bird equivalent of Oscar Pistorius's girlfriend after she's regretted the
decision to go for a piss in the night.
But
like I say.. It's hard to get too mad at this film because it's essentially just the movie version of doing a cheeky queef at a charity 'fart-off for
amnesia' event. Nobody's going to notice it and those that did will already
be starting to forget. Does anybody remember a film called Shrooms?
I didn't think so.. and those that do probably haven't thought about
it since it came out about nine years ago and they thought "Note to self- don't remember that shit film". Well this is just another
one of those 'scary movies' that thinks its main villain is the
psychological embodiment of evil, whereas its biggest threat is
simply that it's fucking boring. In fact if it wasn't for its over
reliance on loud noises and jump-scares then I'd say this would be a
good movie to come in and have a kip to. Sadly I can't say that and
so am now struggling to think who I'd recommend The Forest to if anybody.
Maybe if your partner has severe memory problems due to some sort
of mental trauma then you could come here for a date and then both
forget the movie together as an act of solidarity? The added bonus of
this would be that eventually your partner would also forget they
were mad at you for taking them to see such a crap film. I dunno,
that's really the best thing I can think to say about it, so thanks for reading
motherfuckers, and see you next time.
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