Nightmare Cinema is an anthology movie tied together by scenes inside a movie theater run by someone known simply as The Projectionist, played by Mickey Rourke. Five strangers enter the theater over the course of a period of time and a new movie plays as they enter, starring a version of themselves. As each movie plays out, each of the strangers realize there may be more to this theater than meets the eye.
Despite evoking the feel of an old fashioned “scary story” movie in the vein of other anthology films and series such as Creepshow and Tales from the Crypt, Nightmare Cinema is nowhere near as fun nor as intriguing as either of those anthologies. While it’s expected in any other anthology feature that some segments will hit their mark better than others, it’s almost safe to say that there nearly isn’t anything that works about all of them. And that goes for the scenes that tie each of these segments together, as well.
At best, only about one or two minutes is spent in between each of the actual movie theater scenes. And while it’s understandable that the movie doesn’t want to get bogged down with these sequences, so that they can move on to the next segment, these in-between moments feel like they don’t ever amount to anything. Each scene simply shows a character walking in, sitting down, and the next segment starts. Occasionally, they will be seen interacting with Mickey Rourke’s Projectionist.
If there’s one element that’s probably the most disappointing, it’s just how Rourke essentially goes to waste here. There’s a good chance he has only about five minutes of screen time at best. And when he is seen, he’s clearly phoning it in, lazily delivering a cliched line such as “welcome to my nightmare,” in the most monotonous, non-threatening way possible. And in the end, the scenes involving him don’t even amount up to anything. They feel tacked on, with a vague explanation as to how all the five segments tie together, and don’t really feel like they made much of an impact.
The segments themselves are severely underwhelming as well. One of the most distracting things about all of them is the fact that the production design feels really cheap and clearly fake. And it’s understandable, as it can be difficult to get a film made and sometimes crews need to work with what they’re given. However, it barely even feels like they really tried to work with what they’re given, which makes no sense given how all of the big names behind the scenes for this film have been in the industry for years, some on similar projects with low budgets that worked so much better.
At first, it seems like the film is going to have some fun with its overall “cheap” feel. The first segment, The Thing in the Woods, is by far the most enjoyable of all five segments. The film is a parody of slasher films, with writer-director Alejandro Brugues taking full advantage of the really low budget and made-for-TV production design. The action scenes are ridiculously over-the-top and the dialogue is really corny, with characters giving such bad delivery that it almost feels on purpose. It is a bit jarring at first to realize it’s all one big joke, but once one gets adjusted to it, it’s actually fun, and probably some of the only fun one would have watching this.
The bad acting that went into The Thing in the Woods carries over into just about all of the other segments, though unfortunately, none of the other segments had this same sense of self-awareness that Brugues had while filming that first segment. The closest the film comes to repeating that feel is the third segment, Mashit, a take on exploitation films. It goes back and forth between trying to take itself too seriously and trying to be fun, and the results often feel jarring.
There will be scenes of over-the-top violence that repeat that same sense of fun from the first segment, since they often feel fake and silly due to their poor production designs. Though in between these moments are more scenes of poor acting that unfortunately don’t have that same sense of self-awareness that the first segment had, and come off as just painful to watch. Director Ryuhei Kitamura clearly shows he knows how to have fun with these sort of projects, though it would have been nice if the feel was more consistent throughout this segment.
The film’s second segment, Mirare, directed by Gremlins and Piranha director Joe Dante, is a “Monkey’s Paw” sort of story where a woman with really bad facial scars goes to a plastic surgeon, only to find out she should be careful what she wishes for. This segment just oozes predictability, with the plastic surgeon, played by Richard Chamberlain, is clearly this sinister force that shouldn’t be trusted. Chamberlain’s performance is ridiculously over-the-top though he seems to be the only one in this segment to be in on the joke, with everyone else taking this story way too seriously.
And once again, the acting - outside Chamberlain’s - is pretty bad in this segment, while not quite as bad as either The Thing in the Woods or Mashit, and it becomes difficult to really be invested in any of these characters, outside of the obvious villain. Meanwhile, the film spends nearly most of its run time in the build-up stage, as if it’s ready to shock the audience with a big reveal. However, just like the actual scenes inside the movie theater tying all these segments together, the payoff is severely underwhelming, and feels incredibly rushed, compared to the severe amount of time given to the build-up.
The acting drastically improves for the film’s fourth segment, This Way to Egress. However, unfortunately, this is easily the most boring of all five of the segments. Filmed in black-and-white and done in the style of a minimalist indie drama, this segment not only doesn’t work on its own, but also in comparison to the rest of the film, as the feel doesn’t even remotely match any of the other segments. The film leans a lot more heavily into the abstract, and is meant to feel more psychological in nature, compared to the exploitation style of all the other segments.
Though there’s never really anything about this segment that can grab the audience’s attention. It’s easier to take this more seriously, thanks to the solid direction by Hard Candy and 30 Days of Night director David Slade leading this one. However, most of this segment is spent just showing off different sorts of random images that never really feel like they come together. The same goes for the dialogue, which at times is kept to a minimum. There’s a stream of consciousness sort of feel to this segment that feels more like it’s just throwing out ideas, though never tying any of them together.
By the time the film gets to the fifth segment, Dead, it’s difficult to stay invested, and this segment doesn’t really do anything to keep the audience engaged. Directed by Mick Garris, who also directed the movie theater segments with Rourke, this focuses on a young boy who dies along with his parents, and is the only one of his family brought back to life, only to be attacked by supernatural forces. This is a bit more of an in-between from the exploitation style of the first three segments and the ultra-serious feel of This Way to Egress.
However, despite finding a bit more of a balance in tone, it still doesn’t work. Once again, the acting goes back to being pretty hokey, and what doesn’t help either is some of the atrocious dialogue. A lot of the exchanges often feel repetitive, with characters recycling the same pieces of information that was just revealed. Some of it is meant to be done for dramatic effect, though is ultimately lost by just how forced it feels. There’s one instance in particular where the boy says, upon realizing that his father is dead, “My dad’s dead. He’s dead isn’t he? My dad’s dead,” all in the span of less than ten seconds, and this was just after a separate scene where that question was just asked. The film often feels lazy, and tries to pad its run time out to justify being a full segment, and like with nearly all of the other segments, never really builds towards anything that grabs the audience’s attention.
Nightmare Cinema could have been a fun horror anthology movie that should have taken advantage of its low budget and fun premise. Instead, it’s a very inconsistent movie, with each segment feeling drastically different in tone, most of which never really following through on any interesting ideas it decides to bring up. It contains a lot of poor acting and cheap production designs that makes the film difficult to take seriously, and should have been used to be more of a parody or a goofy exploitation film, which was only accomplished by one of the five segments. And to top it all off, the five segments are lazily tied together by a series of scenes at the movie theater that never build towards anything truly interesting and completely waste the talents of Mickey Rourke. This is one of the year’s most wasted opportunities.
Recommendation: Avoid It
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