سكينامارينك

My hometown isn't exactly known for great movies being produced there, nevermind having great film-makers, so I was hoping that this film would at least break that curse due to the traction that it has been getting. I must also add some positives here and add congrats to the film-maker for completing their project. Making a movie is no small task, on any budget. Sadly that's where the positives begin and end. I've never in my life seen something so boring, I think I've enjoyed watching paint dry more. The shots are lifeless, the sound is horrendous, and my god what in the heck was that final shot? This is a new low in filmmaking. It had nothing redeeming about it, even the most bad films have something you can get out of it but this is just some half assed b.s. Labelled as artsy. If someone could break the curse of terrible filmmaking from my city that would be great, unfortunately that is not the case with Skinamarink. Stay away, stay far away!

Now, I know that this movie technically released in 2022, but didn't come to theaters until 2023. In the second week of January, Skinamarink hits theaters, and is the worst movie of 2023. It played on Friday the 13th, no less. In the same theater I saw this, Friday the 13th part 6 was playing 2 hours later. Figuring that F13 was a later movie, and I'd seen it numerous times, why not check out a new movie? I figured wrong. This is definitely the worst movie I've sat through in my entire life...and that's even after sitting through Pet Sematary 2019, and Halloween Ends. This movie was filmed like a child was trying out his dad's camcorder and didn't properly know how to use it. As if he held the camera in one place, and moved his head instead of the camera, thinking he was recording what his own eyes see. There was no storyline. There was no acting. There were barely any faces. There were about 5 unnecessary jump scares, as in, nothing at all was happening when there was just a jump scare for the sake of calling it a horror movie. I don't think I ever walked out at the end of a movie where the audience was in complete silence trying to have this abomination that passes as cinema sink in. I also don't think I finished a movie and had been as angry as I was to have wasted my time actually going to a theater in hopes of actually seeing a scary movie. Just watch the trailer over and over and it will basically have the same effect as the actual movie. The trailer, though intriguing, and leaves you with a desire to see it just to know what it's about, is exactly what the movie's about...nothing.

It seems like it either triggers some dark childhood fear of the dark & you'll find it terrifying or it will be 140 mins of expectation without much payoff. I'm in the latter category. It has the Lynch vibe some of his movies have where it's like a dream/nightmare & either you're down for the ride or not. If not, it's a brutally boring experience. I just wasn't given enough context to be scared. Most of the time I not only had no idea who was talking or whose POV is being presented, but I couldn't understand 70% of the (very minimal) dialogue. I caught most of what was subtitled. I assume there's a reason for the random subtitles, but I'm not smart enough to understand the point of intentionally letting the indecipherable mumbles/grunts/whispers fly. A couple of scenes and some of the ambient sounds added to the overall creepy vibe, but ultimately just didn't instill any sense of dread, fear, or interest. It wasn't a dream/nightmare or a narrative of childhood primal fear of the unknown, it was just a series of poorly lit set shots & ambiguous mumbles. It seems like it would be more effective as a 15 or 20 minute short.

So, here's the thing. The movie excels at creating disorienting atmosphere, but once you've seen the first twenty minutes, you've seen the whole thing. Two kids wonder around a barely-lit house in grainy, oddly-shot static shots. You see the corner of a doorframe. Cut to a pair of feet. Some lego on the floor. A table leg. It's all so blurry that you'll be squinting for almost the entire runtime. This bizarre directing style is fairly offputting. Sprinkle in some unintelligible whispering, vague spooky noises, and Blair Witch-esque "DID YOU SEE THAT?"s, and that's basically Skinamarink. In fact, it's a LOT like Blair Witch, but with far less interesting characters.