woensdag 6 januari 2016

June (2014)

Summary :
A coming-of-rage story about discovering your true self and overcoming your inner demons to find love in a chaotic world.

Genre : Horror
Country : USA

Cast :
Kennedy Brice : June
Casper Van Dien : Dave Anderson
Victoria Pratt : Lily Anderson

Director : L. Gustavo Cooper

My opinion

"Stop it, Aery. Why are you doing this?
You are a vessel.
Before people, before machines, there is only us.”

Mix the ingredients from several successful films and you get as end result something like "June". It's not terribly bad, but it isn't very original and exciting either. Even the biggest coward can effortlessly watch this film with all the lights off. "June" is the least creepy horror I've ever seen.
Do you remember Drew Barrymore as Charlie in "Firestarter", the sweet girl who could cause a fire just by thinking of it? Or Carrie in the eponymous film who sow the seeds of death and destruction when she was pissed off? June (Kennedy Brice) has similar, telekinetic powers when she gets angry. Or is there a demonic force at work making her as possessed as Regan in "The Exorcist"? Eventually, it all has to do with a primal force called "Aer", which took possession of June during an occult rite. A rite that wasn't finalized perfectly. During that ceremony June was taken away by one of the participants at the last minute.

Lets start with the positive remarks. Although it clearly is a low-budget film, there are still some successful fragments. First there's the changing appearance of June. In particular her eyes. Not that it's innovative, but it reinforced her demonic character. As well as the limited number of scenes where we can witness June's strength. Like for example at the barbecue. But above all, I had great admiration for the young actress Brice. There wasn't much dialogue for her. Probably because of her rather timid and introverted personality. But in general she looked really natural as a young, fragile girl who has to deal with her inner demon. An everyday struggle, attempting to maintain control.

What remains is simply doom and gloom. The shown ritual at the beginning looks really kitschy and when the cult members call upon Aer to take possession of June and this power descends, it just looks as if the wisps of smoke are pasted on the image. Terrible special effects in other words. And there were a few situations that really annoyed me. Firstly, apparently the conditions to be suitable as adoptive family, are abominably bad when you look at the first family. An asocial family with a fat guy resembling Onslow (from Keeping Up Appearances) and a cigarette smoking bimbo who probably works as a prostitute. Compared to them, Lily Anderson (Victoria Pratt) and Dave Anderson (Casper van Dien) are outright saints who radiate comprehensive affection. They're impatient to take on the task of caring father and mother. Perhaps a little overdone because already the first night they start asking June the pertinent question whether or not she wants to call Lily her "Mommy". With disappointed looks as a result of course. This was totally implausible and totally stupid.

But especially the storyline is a huge disappointment. Nothing spectacular happens so to speak. The end of the film is so trivial, I can't even remember what it was anyway (perhaps I fell asleep). So if you never saw "Carrie", "Firestarter", "The Exorcist" or any other film whatsoever with a possessed, demonic character who has control over psychic powers, then you should definitely give this one a chance.