Skinamarink
Skinamarink
Starring Lucas Paul, Dali Rose Tetreault, Ross Paul, Jaime Hill
Directed by Kyle Edward Ball
Starring Lucas Paul, Dali Rose Tetreault, Ross Paul, Jaime Hill
Directed by Kyle Edward Ball
When you were a child, what were you the most afraid of? What nightmares do you still remember? Those are the sorts of questions YouTube creator Kyle Edward Bell asked his audience, and their responses served as the framework for his feature film debut "Skinamarink," but that's just the bare bones of what the film is, which is something that's ultimately terrifying in the fact that it demands you to make your own interpretations, see through grainy frames that something is wrong, and being told in a way that makes the term "slow burn" seem fast compared to what you're witnessing on screen.
One night, children Kevin (Lucas Paul) and Kaylee (Dali Rose Tetreault) notice that their father (Ross Paul) and mother (Jaime Hill) have disappeared, and they hear a disembodied voice that echoes throughout the house. Then they find that the doors and windows are disappearing, and their toys are turning up in strange places, making their once happy home their own private hell.
Hardly anyone has not heard of the little horror film that could, "Skinamarink." Made with a scant $15,000, so far it's grossed well over a million dollars, earning more than 66 times its original budget. It never received a full theatrical release, but merely by word of mouth has it found an audience before hitting the Shudder streaming service in February. Going into the film the only things I knew about the film was the hype, the bare concept, and that's it. Not knowing about it fueled my fears and even though the film is an incredibly slow burn, there wasn't a moment where I wasn't tense and anticipating the thing in the darkness to emerge, and that's due to impeccable directing, editing, and cinematography.
The entire film is an experimental one, a film that defies the norms of cinema and creates its own way that makes it something wholly unique. Here, the film is shot entirely digital but with a grainy effect to it as well as the sound of classic tape scraping throughout, which immediately gives off a sense of unease right from the start and never relents. Scenes aren't polished, but you're straining to see in the darkness something that could or could not be there - you don't know because the grains affect your eyes in a way where you're left thinking you saw something when you didn't - or maybe you did. Not only is it uneasy, but it's unnerving from the very start, making your brain work overtime into what you're seeing and not seeing, blending them together in your mind to concoct a whole new story that's equally terrifying in its simplicity.
The simplicity is what drives the film, as it really does feed into every child's fear: their parents - whom they consider as their own superheroes in a dark world - have disappeared, and now the house that they once called a home is dark, strange, and terrifying. Disembodied voices are heard, doppelgangers appear, and the house totally changes in ways where you don't even recognize it anymore. There is no safe space, and you're left alone facing the fears of the world inside your home.
The camerawork is the main character in this story, as all the actors are shot from the back with hardly a face being seen, and the camera is shown from a kid's perspective: a little elevated from the ground, where doors look like ominous passages to darkness. Then there's static shots of corners, hallways, floors, and even ceilings that leave you with an foreboding sense of dread as you inspect each frame for something happening, and sometimes you see it, even ever so slightly. This is the benefit of the film being an incredibly slow burn one: it doesn't force feed you the story, but allows you to fill in the blanks with your own lifelong fears that creeps in and settles into your very psyche. That's not to say there's no jump scares, but when they come they do it in the most effective ways, where you're left with shivers down your spine. Personally I'm not a fan of jump scares, but here they work so well because they're a natural byproduct of the story, not just thrown in haphazardly to make sure audiences are still awake.
"Skinamarink" is one of those unique horror films that requires you to make your own interpretations of the story taking place. Is it real? Is it a child's overactive imagination? Is it a dream? Answers aren't clearly stated, which only adds to the unease of the film and allows it to devour you from the inside, feeding your former childhood fears that you once thought were starved to death, making you afraid of the dark once more.
The Score: A
One night, children Kevin (Lucas Paul) and Kaylee (Dali Rose Tetreault) notice that their father (Ross Paul) and mother (Jaime Hill) have disappeared, and they hear a disembodied voice that echoes throughout the house. Then they find that the doors and windows are disappearing, and their toys are turning up in strange places, making their once happy home their own private hell.
Hardly anyone has not heard of the little horror film that could, "Skinamarink." Made with a scant $15,000, so far it's grossed well over a million dollars, earning more than 66 times its original budget. It never received a full theatrical release, but merely by word of mouth has it found an audience before hitting the Shudder streaming service in February. Going into the film the only things I knew about the film was the hype, the bare concept, and that's it. Not knowing about it fueled my fears and even though the film is an incredibly slow burn, there wasn't a moment where I wasn't tense and anticipating the thing in the darkness to emerge, and that's due to impeccable directing, editing, and cinematography.
The entire film is an experimental one, a film that defies the norms of cinema and creates its own way that makes it something wholly unique. Here, the film is shot entirely digital but with a grainy effect to it as well as the sound of classic tape scraping throughout, which immediately gives off a sense of unease right from the start and never relents. Scenes aren't polished, but you're straining to see in the darkness something that could or could not be there - you don't know because the grains affect your eyes in a way where you're left thinking you saw something when you didn't - or maybe you did. Not only is it uneasy, but it's unnerving from the very start, making your brain work overtime into what you're seeing and not seeing, blending them together in your mind to concoct a whole new story that's equally terrifying in its simplicity.
The simplicity is what drives the film, as it really does feed into every child's fear: their parents - whom they consider as their own superheroes in a dark world - have disappeared, and now the house that they once called a home is dark, strange, and terrifying. Disembodied voices are heard, doppelgangers appear, and the house totally changes in ways where you don't even recognize it anymore. There is no safe space, and you're left alone facing the fears of the world inside your home.
The camerawork is the main character in this story, as all the actors are shot from the back with hardly a face being seen, and the camera is shown from a kid's perspective: a little elevated from the ground, where doors look like ominous passages to darkness. Then there's static shots of corners, hallways, floors, and even ceilings that leave you with an foreboding sense of dread as you inspect each frame for something happening, and sometimes you see it, even ever so slightly. This is the benefit of the film being an incredibly slow burn one: it doesn't force feed you the story, but allows you to fill in the blanks with your own lifelong fears that creeps in and settles into your very psyche. That's not to say there's no jump scares, but when they come they do it in the most effective ways, where you're left with shivers down your spine. Personally I'm not a fan of jump scares, but here they work so well because they're a natural byproduct of the story, not just thrown in haphazardly to make sure audiences are still awake.
"Skinamarink" is one of those unique horror films that requires you to make your own interpretations of the story taking place. Is it real? Is it a child's overactive imagination? Is it a dream? Answers aren't clearly stated, which only adds to the unease of the film and allows it to devour you from the inside, feeding your former childhood fears that you once thought were starved to death, making you afraid of the dark once more.
The Score: A
Comments
Post a Comment