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| To be perfectly clear, Winchester (2018) is not really about Sara Winchester, but actually about this guy (Jason Clarke) |
I'm big fans of the Spierig brothers, Michael and Peter. On a lark, I saw
Undead (2003) in theaters, and I utterly adored it (even though Owen Gleiberman savaged it in
EW--he didn't "get it"). I liked
Daybreakers (2009) and I think
Predestination (2014) is a work of genius--seriously, it's brain melting brilliant. So, I was not prepared at all for the absolute s***show that is their latest film,
Winchester (2018), although if I had known that they'd joined the Blumhouse family already with
Jigsaw (2017), I would have hesitated. The film has been getting press mostly regarding its "based on a true story" moniker, since
supposedly Sarah Winchester, the heir to the Winchester rifle fortune, built the Winchester Mystery House in San Jose in order to appease the ghosts that had died from her family's rifles--something she could never quite do, so she kept building, and building, and building that damn house. Some parts of that story are true--she was an heiress to the rifle fortune, she built a house in San Jose--but a lot of it is apocryphal, and the Spierigs take the bones of the story, and turn the silliness dial up to twelve, because eleven just isn't far enough. The trailer makes the film
seem like a great haunted house yarn centering on Sarah Winchester, played by the weirdly ageless Helen Mirren like a goth Miss Havisham, traipsing around in full grief regalia the whole damn time.
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| The awesome Helen Mirren as a goth Miss Havisham, er...I mean Sarah Winchester |
This woman frequently comes across as intelligent and regal, no matter what kind of crappy role she's given, and trust me, this one is truly crappy. She's no Jane Tennyson. While you would think the film is about her, it's actually about Dr. Eric Price (Jason Clarke) a washed-up laudanum junkie doctor who had a brush with death that made him lose his "once in a lifetime love" from which he's never quite recovered (ergo laudanum). He's hired by the minority shareholders of the Winchester Rifle Co. to declare Sarah Winchester nuts so they can take over her controlling share of the company, and she will subsequently stop building her damn house. He shows up at the construction site in San Jose, to find everyone expecting him and not excited about it. Not only is Sarah wise to his laudanum habit, but her niece (Sarah Snook) and her painfully annoying son, Henry, are not fans of his either. Also, Henry has this habit of sleepwalking with a bag over his head in the oddest places, and talking in weird voices with glazed over white eyes. See, still not really about Sarah here. Ugh, I'm still mad that I paid for this film.
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| The Winchester House looks like a fake stage set, which is what the Spierigs shot on, in Australia |
Dr. Price has a special connection to the Winchester House, since he was shot with a Winchester rifle, and died for 3 minutes, then came back to life--which makes him the only one who can stop an especially malevolent ghost played by Richard Horne from
Twin Peaks: The Return (Eamon Farren), who absolutely defines the term "ugly pretty." Turns out that only Sarah and Eric can see this ghost, although he possesses annoying nephew Henry any chance he gets. The film goes on, and on, and on, with Eric thinking that Sarah's crazy, and then realizing that she's not and that everything she says is totally true, even when delivered in an over-the-top scenery chewing fashion by Mirren. In fact, I almost nodded off at one point--in a movie theater, with some guy opening and crumpling every plastic covered snack food imaginable behind my head. One would think that nodding off would be
physically impossible since this film is almost entirely made of jump scares--really dumb, overly telegraphed jump scares. I guess the insipid, stilted dialogue induced narcolepsy.
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| False advertising--this film is not about what's going on inside Sarah Winchester's head |
Finally, Jason Clarke, Eric, whatever, figures his s*** out, gives Sarah a clean bill of health, and but for a few ornery nails (far more entertaining in a Quay Brothers film), all is well. Except for the fact that the Spierig Brothers have squandered all my good will toward them. Now I think I understand why, before the film, the Brothers headline a very brief making-of doc and "thank us all" for going to see their film. Yeah, you're not welcome guys. Not welcome at all. Let me put it this way: both
Havenhurst and
The Abandoned were better films. Not
Visions, though. That film was on par with this one. Ugh,
Winchester.
