Three Films Make A Post: Some connections never die.

Conjuring Spirit aka Hush aka Chung Cu Ma (2014): This Vietnamese movie about a writer escaping her difficult marriage by removing herself into a cheap apartment only to find it haunted by a vengeful spirit, as directed by Van M. Pham, has some interesting ideas seeded into a too standard South East Asian horror tale. I like the way the ghost’s and our heroine Lan’s (played by Phuong Mai) troubles with shitty men mirror one another, as well as how the film suggests Lan is slowly taking on the role her series detective character has in her novels in the real world. Alas, the film is slower paced than the material allows and has some of the most ill-placed odious comic relief I’ve encountered in quite some time. The horror set pieces are decently directed but also suffer from being much too generic to hit.

Shadow of the Wraith aka Ikisudama (2001): Also a bit too sluggish in its pacing is this two story anthology movie by veteran horror (and other things) director Toshiharu “Evil Dead Trap” Ikeda. The tales also suffer under a clearly inexperienced cast with awesome hair and moments where the low budget wins out over Ikeda’s ambitions. While the material in the script and before the camera isn’t great, Ikeda does his best to fight these problems. Particularly in the first story, he does unsubtle but highly effective work with colour tinting, and both stories feature quite a few so wonderfully blocked shots, it’s difficult not to recommend the movie for them alone.

Mr. Harrigan’s Phone (2022): John Lee Hancock’s adaptation of a solid (but certainly not spectacular) Stephen King novella doesn’t only hold itself rather more closely to the story than these things often do, but also breathes the same air of solid, if mostly uninspired competence as the tale. It is well-shot, well-directed in a slightly old-fashioned and conservative way, earnest and serious as a coming-of-age tale with occasional off-screen murder, and a perfectly fine way to while a way an afternoon with a tale of the supernatural. That’s certainly not enough to get excited about the film, but I found myself enjoying this one’s solidness in every aspect of filmmaking and storytelling. At the very least, there’s a fine late period Donald Sutherland performance to enjoy.