Synopsis:
In We Summon the Darkness three best friends embark on a road trip to a heavy-metal show, where they bond with three aspiring musicians and head off to one of the girls’ country home for an after-party. (synopsis taken from IMDB)
Alt Cover:
I actually like this cover better than the one they went with. It’s really cool!
Stats:
Directed by: Marc Meyers
Written by: Alan Trezza
Starring: Alexandra Daddario, Maddie Hasson, Amy Forsyth, Keean Johnson
My Edition:
Streaming – Netflix
My Thoughts:
Before I really get into the movie, I have to have a small rant: This movie was supposed to be set in the 80s, and to capitalize on the height of Satanic Panic. Only one of those things is even moderately believable, and it’s not the one about being set in the 80s. The wardrobe choices were all over the place. There were a few spots of brilliance (see Alexis’ stepmom, or one news reporter, who both looked quite right for the time period), surrounded by…everything else (which just looked like a bunch of people in 80s-inspired-wear from Forever 21).
Search 80s aesthetic on Instagram, and you’ve pretty much nailed the wardrobe. It was really distracting and honestly, I had a hard time noticing much beyond all of my questioning about the wardrobe (why are they wearing skinny jeans? why are all the band shirts visibly brand new? why was there not a single instance of rock-hard skyscraper bangs or palm tree hair?). And the money – by all that is good in this world, do NOT get me started on the fucking money.
Ok, I’ll say a little – this is what a $100 bill looked like in 1988 (the year the film is set). Watch the movie, and when they get to the part with the cash, tell me if it looks like this (it most certainly does not – it is the so-called ‘big head’ version, which didn’t come out until the early 2000s). It’s the little shit that makes or breaks a film’s ability to suck a viewer in, and this one broke it, sadly.
Once I was able to move beyond that, I feel like the movie itself wasn’t that bad. It was just looking past…the visuals…that was a challenge. I now realize that this is what makes it a movie…So, ummm…I think I would have liked this better as a book.
Although there were two things that I loved about this movie:
Val makes some truly entertaining faces throughout the film. She’s actually a pretty captivating performer, even if her character doesn’t exactly do a bang-up job of proving it. And Johnny Knoxville. Fucking Knox. The Captain. I just love that affable doof so much. And honestly, he shines in this. His role is small as far as screentime goes, but he doesn’t waste it.
Look, is this movie great? Definitely not. Is the plot super original? No. But it does have some truly fun moments, and a few of the performances are real standouts. If you’ve even been toying around with watching it, you totally should. If you can look past what I’ve bitched about here, it’s actually a pretty fun film.
And I didn’t even bitch about the whole, “Can I have a Pabst?” thing. Cuz that made me batty, but I chose to believe that this ridiculous bit of dialogue (seriously, never in the whole of my existence have I heard someone call it anything other than a PBR, or if they’re 900 years old, maybe Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer) was added to indicate that things weren’t as they appeared to be.
My Rating:
I really did want to like this movie, but ultimately, it felt like while the story itself was decent, there was so little attention paid to set or wardrobe dressing being time-period appropriate that it was both incredibly distracting and kind of insulting. I mean, I had to live through late 80s fashion – don’t try to church it up, okay? It is what it is. All those beautiful women will still look beautiful wearing stupid 80s cuts.
No matter what though, at the end of the day I still thought We Summon the Darkness was okay. I respect what they were trying to do (umm, hello Heavy Metal Parking Lot), I just wish that there had been better attention to detail. I’ll probably never watch it again, but I’m not mad I watched it the first time.
We Summon the Darkness
Directed by: Marc Meyers
Released: April 10, 2020
Saban Films
Rated R
91 Minutes
