Directed by Lorcan Finnegan [Other horror films: Without Name (2016)]
From the striking poster to the intriguing trailer, Vivarium is a movie that held my interest from the first time I heard of it. I didn’t seek it out, though – like a bird of prey, or a sleek panther, I waited. I watched. I wanted to hear what others thought of it before I jumped in. I was going to watch it anyway, but I like to have a barometer on odd occasions.
And I didn’t really hear that much about this one. A few comments on Twitter, perhaps, but either negative or positive, I didn’t run across all that many. Now, that could in part be due to the fact I don’t delve deeply into the Twitter horror community, but I think something also has to be said about how Vivarium, despite the unique premise, doesn’t end up feeling that memorable.
To be sure, there are a few scenes and ideas I’ll remember, but for a film that’s about an hour and forty minutes, there’s a bit of dearth when it comes to meat in the story. The basic idea is cool, and it’s what first got me interested in the movie – a young couple go to see a house, and get stuck in a suburban maze of houses with no way out.
It’s a fine idea. It’s a more philosophical approach to horror, and the story primarily comes from the cyclical natures of parenthood. The movie isn’t much grounded in reality, of course – there’s seemingly no way out of this suburban neighborhood, boxes are mysteriously left for the couple with no idea of who dropped them off, and sidewalks can be lifted up, but that’s philosophy for you: it has something to say, and little practical ways to apply it.
There’s a large portion of the movie which deals with the couple, who, after being given a mysterious baby in a box, have to raise the child. It’s not a normal child – it shrieks inhumanly whenever it wants something, it mimics the couple’s voices with eerie accuracy, and it has an abnormal physiology. Personally, I’m assuming it’s an alien, but because this movie goes hand-in-hand with Kafka, don’t expect any answers, because you’re not getting them.
Some of the horror, or more appropriately, tension, is pretty well done. Early on, Jonathan Aris’ character mimics Imogen Poots while showing the couple the house, and generally acts like an over-enthusiastic, creepy individual. The sprawling neighborhood, impossible to escape from and the houses all exactly the same, does bring a strong sense of oppression with it. Related, the clouds that never seem to move, and in fact, never vary in shape, are rather disturbing too. Oh, and toward the end, while I’m lukewarm to the finale as a whole, there was a pretty creepy scene in which a character seemed to lift up the sidewalk and go inside another realm.
Imogen Poots (Green Room, Fright Night, Black Christmas) does pretty well. There’s certainly a good sense of despair, though as we’re given a few time-skips, I don’t think we see it occur naturally in real time. Jesse Eisenberg (who I know best from The Social Network, but has also been in Zombieland and Cursed) does decently too, though there comes a point where his character sort of fades into the background. Though Jonathan Aris (who played Anderson on Sherlock) only really appears toward the beginning of the film, his creepy mannerisms do add quite a bit.
Like I said, I felt lukewarm toward the finale. It’s not that I necessarily wanted all the answers (such as the nature of the neighborhood, the realities under the pavement, whether these things were alien or not, etc), but at the same time, I think a few would have been nice. Cube is a fun film, but I’d still like more than just the set-up, and the same goes for Vivarium, which has such a striking plot, but aside from being a clear metaphor for parenthood, I’m not sure how many of the elements make sense.
More to the point, while some scenes were well worth seeing, I don’t think that Vivarium is going to end up that memorable a movie. It was okay, and I definitely didn’t think it was a bad film, but memorable? I doubt it. Interesting idea, but I wish the execution went better.
6/10
Jiggy's Horror Corner 