A new holiday horror favorite.
I can’t put my finger on it, but there’s something about movies taking place during New Year’s Eve which call to mind tales of horror and suspense. For some reason, the promise of a new year and second chances has lent itself well to movies dealing in the darkness of everyday life and those who decide to go dallying in it. From the cheesy 80s slasher New Year’s Evil, to the somewhat more credible (yet only slightly less cheesy Terror Train), to the underrated surrealist 40s noir Repeat Performance, New Year’s Eve is a holiday which has subtly come to signify a halting of tranquility and the welcoming of unforeseen horror. Midnighters is the latest in this very odd sub-genre, and while the film may come across as somewhat inconsequential, this exercise in New Year’s Eve fear still contains a good amount of fun for the right audience.
In Midnighters, a young couple named Lindsey (Alex Essoe) and Jeff (Dylan McTee) are at a party ringing in the new year with a marriage on the rocks. Once happy, the two are now plagued by financial problems and other mounting tension in their life together. On the way home, the two accidentally hit a man standing in the middle of the street. When the pair try to cover up the accident by bringing the lifeless body back to their large secluded home, it sets off a chain of events involving Lindsey’s sister Hannah (Perla Haney-Jardine) and a mysterious stranger named Smith (Ward Horton), a detective investigating the accident.
By now so many thrillers have been labeled Hitchcockian as a tribute to the master of suspense, Alfred Hitchcock. It has become a term thrown around endlessly and carelessly; so much so that when an effort does come around which IS Hitchcockian, it’s hard not to become excited. Midnighters is such an example. The film is likened to the peeling of an onion, with its story revealing layer after layer of carefully thought out mystery; all of which should prove incredibly satisfying to fans of the genre. One of the greatest strengths of the film is the world in which the characters find themselves in, which is a fantastic study isolation. The world of Midnighters, with it’s melancholic daytime and sparse land, looks like it has room for no one but the four central characters and the darkness which surrounds them. Skewed angles and offbeat lighting choices elevate the proceedings and gives the film more of a sleek and polished look than its low-budget pedigree might otherwise suggest. It’s the perfect physical setting to execute a seemingly endless amount of tension which is wonderfully and expertly held to great nail-biting (no pun intended) effect, before being allowed to play itself out.
At the risk of doing nothing but singing the praises of Midnighters however, it should be stated that the film isn’t without its faults. In spite of some great scenes of terror and suspense, there a few too many times there is not enough excitement to be had. The majority of these “slow” moments occur when the action takes a pause so that Lindsey and Jeff make yet another attempt at trying to put their hopeless marriage back together in the midst of the situation they find themselves in. On the other end of the spectrum, there are instances when Midnighters proves to be just too dark of a film….literally. There are so many scenes with little or no light to illuminate what is happening on the screen regardless of the time of day. This would be a fine, moody tactic if it wasn’t for the fact that there are a number important actions happening of which we only get certain glimpses of. When light does come however, Midnighters becomes a very beautiful thriller that is equal parts exciting and exquisite.
It’s in the performance area where Midnighters also tends to fall a little flat. While it’s usually easy to forgive actors for only being able to do what they can with the script in their hands, in this case, McTee, Essoe and Haney-Jardine are themselves forced to take the blame. While no one can say the actors don’t try, it’s hard not to notice the fact that the trio tends to play more to the iconic aspects of the genre than they do the human elements of their characters or the script’s ideology. Only Horton is able to avoid this by crafting Smith as a true villain so alluring and menacing, that he nearly steals the show.
The inevitability of Midnighters getting compared to other slasher thrill rides is understandable. The film has the structure of an I Know What You Did Last Summer and turns akin to Shallow Grave. Yet Midnighters contains enough unique flavor to be considered a worthy genre exercise in its own right. The biggest way it accomplishes this feat is in being one of the greatest lessons in the construction of a cat-and-mouse tale, with alliances between the characters shifting at such a rapidly fun pace. Above all though, Midnighters is so secure in its strength as a thriller and in its love of the genre whose name it bears. Never once does the film seem overly concerned with mechanics of the plot and the actual shedding of blood as it is with the action-filled twists and the character motivations behind them.
