The Gallows (2015)
Ted Hentschke
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Directed by Travis Cluff and Chris Lofing
Starring Reese Mishler, Pfeifer Brown, Ryan Shoos, and Cassidy Gifford
I’m publishing this against a contradicting review. It isn’t something I’m foreign to, but I’m usually on the other side. I have written a negative review for The Order: 1886 and The Babadook against Dread Central consensus. Now, here I am, contradicting the viewpoints of my Editor and colleagues by saying that I thought The Gallows was actually bitchin’.
I will admit that The Gallows has many negative qualities. I’ve heard some pretty diverse criticism, ranging from that it felt amateurish to that it felt like a calculated Hollywood cash grab designed to expertly hit on all the key points summer teens desire. As dichotomous as these statements are, it hits the nail on the head. There are parts of this movie that someone with more experience would know better than to do, but the high school drama and breadcrumb plot smacks of a studio exec imagining giant sacks of daddy’s money above the head of braindead teens. The plot is loose, the dialogue at many times inane, and several times the movie insulted my intelligence.
*Beware, For Here There Be Spoilers*
In particular, the scene where they happen upon the TV playing the recording of the news broadcast from 20 years prior really rustled my jimmies. Half an hour ago, you have a conspicuous interview with an odd loner woman with messy blonde hair and grey streaks that explains that she was there during the the tragic events of the first play. A bit after that, you impressed upon us that his girlfriend, who was the lead in the play and also a blonde girl, witnessed it all go down. There were 5 people on stage, and one blonde girl. I put 2 and 2 together during the first minutes of the movie, when the blonde girl on stage stared longingly into Charlie’s eyes. When she appears on the television as “Charlie’s Girlfriend”, I get that this is the point where that all comes together. I might have figured it out before, but it is good to have confirmation, so whatever. When you then have one of the main characters point at the TV and go, “Oh shit, that’s the woman from before,” then you, sir, have insulted me. You have shagged my wife in the living room and pretended it was ballet practice level of insulting intelligence. My wife is a hog and would never pass for a ballerina. Check and mate, sir.
I also could have done without the ending. For me, the movie should have ended at the final bow. They bow, applause is heard in the theater, the lights are still dark, movie ends. I didn’t need this whole “they actually had known this ghost for a long time and were dogmatically obsessed with it” weird shoehorned ending. It went from a unique original story to “ghost cult” in a ruinous minute. So they are just sitting in a trance and watching the TV like zombies, when before they acted like normal people? Is the school/play haunted like everyone else said with doors opening on their own at night, or is the ghost following them around? Did they summon it with the play, or did they always know it was there?
There are also more plot holes than a Swiss cheese documentary. Pfeifer had no way of knowing they would all be there that night, let alone somehow set them up. People couldn’t trick me to go to school in the daytime, much less at night to do physical labor. Maybe she planned to hang him during the play normally like it was 20 years ago, and this all just conveniently happened. Given that would mean they need to make a sequel explaining the play from 1993, that very well might be the case.
*Fear Not, The Land Of Spoilers Is Long Passed*
For those of you who have skipped to this point, I just spent the last 3 paragraphs nitpicking the plot elements I didn’t like. That leaves the delightfully spoiler-free technical aspects to address. Shot wise, this movie makes an excellent shoe advertisement. The amount of time we spend staring at someone’s feet as they crouch, argue, and contemplate their next move is stupid. It is a stupid amount of time for the stupid reasoning that people don’t hold the camera up while talking about their stupid lives or going about their stupid crouch-walks. I guess it adds to the realism, but so would a character awkwardly sneezing and their parents asking if they are coming down with a cold and them insisting that it was just allergies. Not everything realistic makes for good storytelling. More so, reaction shots during scary moments do not for a realistic scary movie make.
In the manner of Sir Mix-A-Lot, here comes a big “but.” I love dramatically built-up buts, of this I cannot lie. I recognize all of the negatives, but they really didn’t bother me that much. Aside from the first thing I mentioned in the spoiler section and the movie’s ending, nothing in the movie put me off. Instead, I felt an overwhelming sense of dread.
The Gallows is fantastic introductory horror. At some point in our lives, we watched that movie that was accessible, fun, and scared the shit out of our unsalted hearts. For me, it was The Ring. I still consider sitting through the entire video sequence unblinking as one of the most harrowing experiences of my life, despite it being relatively tame compared to all the other horrors I’ve sat through. For many of my friends, that movie was The Grudge, Kayako’s mystic demon hair being both nightmare fuel and the target of endless satire. At the time, I couldn’t judge the difference between the quality of the two films. As an adult, more worldly and educated, it is clear to me that The Ring is a more technically crafted film, with far less reliance on cheap scares and a more thrilling narrative. You can argue this point, but you’d be missing the forest for the trees.
The Gallows is nestled in this little sweet spot, straddling the lines between teen romance drama and genuinely terrifying movie. It doesn’t rely on any cheap occult gimmicks like Stay Alive that isolate the demographic with poor treatment of the subject matter. It is a high school thriller about high schoolers doing dumb high school stuff and trying to deal with an impossible threat. It is simple, but relatable. The story is predictable, but not contrived. It is conventional, but the convention works. Most importantly, it all comes together to be terrifying.
I don’t mean to come off as saying that the movie is all poorly done and I just liked it anyways. The camera work conveyed a claustrophobic and ominous feel, with the only natural lighting being the reds of the emergency lights. Even with open settings like the auditorium and hallways of the school, you feel how trapped they are. The only places they can go lead them into more ominous situations, like rats in an insidious maze.
I also thought that the plot was unique. There were some bad turns at the end, but the idea of a haunted play evokes The King in Yellow in a way I dig. It was well enough acted and believable. It felt like different personalities acting like they would in high school, often doing things more for spectacle before breaking down under pressure. As far as to specific scenes I liked…
*Once More Into The Spoiler Breach We Go!*
Despite the tendency to over-explain, there were a number of much more muted scenes that really sold me. The sequence of scares worked, going from subtle to full-on ghosting in a steady pace. When they come back to the stage and find the gallows to be completely rebuilt, the noose is in a much tighter fastening than before. We get a ghostly videotape next, setting up the backstory, followed by a hanging shadowy figure in a decrepit part of the school. Distant steps herald the approach of the first attack, and the rope burns around Cassidy’s neck reflect the growing intensity. Each scare builds on the previous, and it all ramps up well into the film’s climax. It’s paced just well enough to not feel too quick or be a letdown.
*The Eastern Spoiler Front Has Been Reached!*
It is far from a perfect film, but the bits of genius I saw flecked throughout were the kind that a me of days long past would have noticed and felt engaged by. Seeing the shoeless body, I would have figured out who it was recalling the previous shot where the ghost took them. It wasn’t Kubrick, but I have seen The Shining at least a dozen times and still probably missed about 70% of the symbolism. Not all movies need to revolutionize horror. Some just need to scare you. And The Gallows scared me.
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Film
Categorized:Reviews
