10/20/2019 - Midsommar (2019) - 7/10

A vibrant and stinging bit of strange and discomfort from a special film-making voice. Better than his previous lauded weirdness (Hereditary), I loved the subtlety and light insistent anxiety within each scene. Done with the insidious changes and eccentricities of set, staging, and camera work, the film is a work of unease and art.

So easy to empathize with the characters, off put and isolated with the foreignness of culture, language and the trippiness of drugs. Creeping drumbeat of unsettling promise mixed with the skin tingle of hallucinatory bewilderment.

I expected more bombast to the scare, more fright and chills. I suppose people were shocked by the “hammer”, but if you couldn’t see that coming, I question your attentiveness or imagination. It just wasn’t that devastating scare that was whispered about. Honestly, I appreciated that I was less about the jump but more about the dread. It was a visceral and pervertedly magical experience which was a treat.