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There are two kinds of film fan. Those that define Ethan Hawke through his collaborations with Richard Linklater, and there are those that connect him with Scott Derrickson. Yes, Linklater brought him critical acclaim but Derrickson gave him two major career shifts.
First, Hawke made his first horror film in found footage chiller’s child murderer, is back. As he warns Finney , dead is just a word. After all, the original film centered on abducted Finney being given clues to defeat the Grabber by the ghosts of his earlier victims. Three years later, both Finney and his psychic little sister, Gwen , are still haunted by the events of his near-death experience and killing of the mask-wearing menace. All that trauma is simply amplified by the fact that they’re now literally being haunted by the Grabber – the metaphorical supernatural shoe being very much on the other foot.was the zenith of Derrickson’s career as a horror filmmaker. Based on a short story by Joe Hill, its strength was its simplicity. He created truly innovative terrors through its narrative minimalism , character-driven scares, and a lived-in aesthetic created through juxtaposing varying film stocks to which he added layers of gray and grime to evoke childhood nightmares. Having established the look and the feel of the Grabberverse, Derrickson doesn’t simply repeat the low-key supernatural shocks of the original. Instead, he uses that distinctive aesthetic and deploys it to radically different ends. Ifriffs on their more polished and sometimes absurd successors. It’s like cueing up Mötley Crüe’s sparky glam metal rockeris also not afraid to be nakedly derivative if it adds to the fun. Derrickson’s script, inspired by further conversations with Hill and co-written by his longtime creative partner C. Robert Cargill, makes unabashed nods to theon ice as the Grabber wears skates to track down his victims, and Finney and Gwen try to solve the mystery of why he’s able to come back. That said, even they can’t work out exactly how he can pierce the veil as the sequel’s expanded cosmology seems a little vague, to say the least. The basic rule seems to be “if it makes for a good kill, it’s OK,” and sadly the Grabber gets more hijinks and backstory than actual character development. It’s not like Hawke’s wasted, but he’s less terrifying than in the original, a little more Freddy inDerrickson seems to have put more effort into the relationship between Finney and Gwen, and the emotional burden that the events of the first film inflicted as they navigate their still-raw relationship with their newly sober dad . If anything, this is more Gwen’s film than Finney’s, and McGraw proves that Derrickson’s instincts about her were right on the first film as she strikes a more fun tone here.Directed by Scott Derrickson. Starring Madeleine McGraw, Mason Thames, Ethan Hawke. Jeremy Davies, Arianna Rivas, Demián Bichir, Miguel Mora, Maev Beaty, Graham Abbey has been Austin’s independent news source for over 40 years, expressing the community’s political and environmental concerns and supporting its active cultural scene. Now more than ever, we need your support to continue supplying Austin with independent, free press. If real news is important to you, please consider making a donation of $5, $10 or whatever you can afford, to help keep our journalism on stands.The Chronicle's first Culture Desk editor, Richard has reported on Austin's growing film production and appreciation scene for over a decade, and also oversees the paper's coverage of the visual and performance...has a brand new website. All the content is the same, but we're using a new web publishing platform called Newspack. Please bear with us over the next few weeks as we work out the kinks.
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