SDAFF ’16: The Unbidden

They say a friend will help you move, but a real friend will help you move a body. In that case, Lauren Lee has three real friends. Twenty years after her husband’s “mysterious disappearance,” the four women hold a séance to exorcise his spirit, but the ceremony will expose a lot of messy secrets in Quentin Lee’s The Unbidden (trailer here), which screens as part of this year’s San Diego Asian Film Festival.

The four friends should well complement each other when it comes to spirit rousting. Lee is a successful mystery novelist, Rachel is a medium (or whatever), Kat is a doctor (plastic surgeon, but it still counts), and Anna was a tiger-mother before the term was stereotyped in the media. Jake was a bad husband, but not always. Initially, it looked like he and Lee would be happy together, until his bottled-up demons reasserted themselves. He really forced Lee to supply the killing he was asking for, but the circumstances were awkward. That is where Lee’s friends came in.

Of course, Jake’s spirit has been restless ever since. As the fateful date approaches (fittingly Halloween), the hauntings have dramatically increased in their invasiveness, taking a pronounced toll on Lee’s mental state. Unfortunately, the ritual will be interrupted by a mysterious stranger, who has a personal stake in their drama.

Get ready for a barrage of revelations and recriminations. Unbidden is one of the least gory horror films you will see all year, but the fab four still draw plenty of blood. Being such close friends, they know exactly where to slip the knives in. In many ways, Unbidden represents the road too often not taken when it comes to horror films. This is a character-driven, dialogue-rich film featuring an overwhelmingly female cast, covering the full moral-ethical spectrum.

There are also some reasonably clever twists down the stretch, but for many the 1980s nostalgia will be the real attraction. Notably, Unbidden stars fan-favorite Tamlyn Tomita (Karate Kid II) as Lee and co-stars Julia Nickson (freedom fighter Co Bao in Rambo: First Blood Part II, one of three women to exchange dialogue with Stallone throughout the entire franchise) as the boozy and cynical Dr. Kat.

Tomita is terrific as the literally haunted and guilt-ridden Lee. It is also pretty remarkable how well her performance meshes with that of Michelle Krusiec as the flashback Lee. Nickson and Elizabeth Sung both have great fun chewing the scenery as the contemporary Kat and Anna, while Akemi Look vamps it up something fierce as flashback Kat. As Jake (flashbacks only for him), former champion kickboxer Jason Yee vividly conveys a sense of sexualized danger and slow-burning angst.

Indeed, Unbidden is a great ensemble piece. Quentin Lee’s handle on horror movie mechanics is just okay, but he gets some wonderfully acid-tongued exchanges from the first class cast. Recommended for supernatural horror fans with a mature sensibility, The Unbidden screens tomorrow (11/4), during the 2016 SDAFF.

The Invitation: Dinner Party with Kool-Aid

Never ignore the weird things people say. We are socially conditioned to explain away odd statements. We want to think so-and-so “just didn’t realize how that sounded.” Unfortunately, this just sets us up for even worse awkwardness. A grieving father recognizes the bizarre nature of his ex-wife’s cult, but his ragingly anti-social behavior will not help his cause in Karyn Kusama’s The Invitation (trailer here), which releases today in a special BluRay-DVD-digital bundle.

When Will and Eden’s son Ty died in a freak accident, it killed their marriage as well. For the last two years, he has tortured himself, while Eden disappeared off the face of the earth. It turns out she was in Mexico with her future second husband David and members of a supposed grief support group called Invitation. However, even David Miscavige would admit they display cult like tendencies. Plus, the leader vaguely resembles Wayne Dyer.

Having finally returned her luxurious house in the Hills, where she once lived with David and Ty, Eden throws a homecoming party for her old friends. She also invites Will and his relatively new significant other, Kira. Pruitt and Sadie, two of Eden’s fellow cult members are also there to give Will bad vibes. Before long they bust out the cult recruitment videos, but everyone except Will is still willing to give them the benefit of the doubt.

Through rapid cuts, Kusama shows us brief, nearly subliminal flashbacks, flashforwards, or representations of Will’s inner emotional turmoil. It is intended to keep us off-balance and guessing whether Will or David and Eden are the nutty ones, but it only clouds the narrative.

However, Kusama is spot-on in the ways she depicts the other guests bending over backward to explain away the dubious behavior of Eden and David and Pruitt and Sadie. Kasuma and screenwriters Phil Hay & Matt Manfredi perfectly nail the ways cults manipulate people. It is a pretty darned frightening process to watch unfold.

Arguably, all the time Will spends sulking on his own ought to be a credibility problem, considering he is at a dinner party with old friends, but you can hardly blame him. The only guest who seems like any fun is Michelle Krusiec’s hard partying Gina, but at least she gives the film constant energy boosts. As Will, Logan Marshall-Green broods like a monster. John Carroll Lynch (Marge Gunderson’s husband in Fargo) is creepy as heck as Pruitt. Likewise, Michiel Huisman’s David is smoothly sinister, but Tammy Blanchard’s drugged out expression and Morticia Addams wardrobe are dead giveaways as to Eden’s true colors.

Eden’s well-appointed home is also a real design triumph. Looking both tony and eerie, it facilitates the story quite remarkably. Periodically, Kusama will push the envelope of credibility, but when she simply lets events unspool, it is uncomfortably believable. Definitely recommended for horror fans (despite some quibbles along the margin), The Invitation is now available on BluRay/DVD from Drafthouse/MVD.