Reviewed! Crimson Peak

Usually I glare contemptuously at anyone who says to me: “Oh I like to watch movies so I can relax and zone out”.

Relax? Zone out? WTF? Film isn’t a sedative. It’s all about changing the world – or at least your own world – from the comfort of your cinema seat. Or so I tell people, in something of a sanctimonious fashion, sneering somewhat.

And yet, with Crimson Peak, I did just that. I sat. I watched. I enjoyed. I relaxed. Will I remember Crimson Peak in three years, or even three weeks’ time?

It’s doubtful.

It certainly didn’t move anything inside these here gizzards. But by Jove, it was certainly better than clipping my toenails.

With sumptuous sets that are good enough to eat, Crimson Peak is a lot like a pavlova. Majestic-looking and dizzying to behold, but when you bite into it, well it’s a bit thin.

Nothing but sugar.

And that’s kind of a shame, because it’s a pavlova made by something of a master chef. Directed and co-written by Guillermo del Toro (Pan’s Labyrinth), Crimson Peak brings an utterly respectable cast along to this somewhat lacking spooky party, with the likes of Tom Hiddleston, Mia Wasikowska and Jessica Chastain.

Set in the late 1800s, young aspiring author Edith (Wasikowska) can see ghosts. Her creepy deceased mother likes to pop in every now and then, with scary, swirly bits of black smoke ascending from her grizzly teeth, to give her innocent and petrified daughter a few pieces of advice and a warning here and there.

Everything goes well for a while, until a sexy English miner and entrepreneur, Thomas Sharpe (Hiddleston) sweeps into town with his beautiful but dark sister Lucille (Chastain).

Edith’s dad (Jim Beaver) isn’t keen on these good-looking but somehow shonky Brits coming in and seducing his little girl, but things go from bad to worse for him when he ends up six foot under and Edith ends up married to Mr Sharpe and living in his creepy house.

The house is falling to pieces, located as it is on top of a mine, with gooey red minerals seeping through the floorboards. The place is reminiscent of the home of that horrible bastard Bluebeard – you know, the one from the children’s stories who wasn’t a particularly choice hubby.

Our young, blonde, wide-eyed protagonist is left to make sense of it all – and hopefully keep her body parts attached in the process.

The plot is good and the story is interesting, but please o’ please do we need to be hit over the head with obviousness throughout? The script at times lacks subtlety, taking away from the whole “suspense of disbelief” thing.

The character of Lucille particularly suffers from a bad case of the obvs throughout, which again is a shame because other than that she’s wonderfully sexy and sadistic, a bloodied Snow White, if you will.

The other thing is the film would have been miles better if we’d been spared the super spooky ghosts throughout, which quite frankly, were a bit silly. We get it – they’re sad and they’re murdered and whatever else – we don’t need to see bloodied demons walking through the house with axes lodged in their faces and ventricles dribbling all over the floor.

One of the most marvellous things about Crimson Peak is the meticulous care and dedication to beauty throughout.

You could take a still shot from nearly any point within the film and frame it and stick it on your wall, it is that gorgeous. But it is also incredibly violent and brutal, and this certainly adds another darker, contextual layer to that beauty.

Three stars.

Crimson Peak is currently showing at the State Cinema and Village Cinema, Hobart.
Amber Wilson