Saturday, August 2, 2008

Conviction



Author(s): Douglas Reese (MI)
Conviction

Written and Directed by Eli Roth
Produced by Eli Roth
Director of Photography: Milan Chadima
Edited by George Folsey, Jr.

Cast:

Jeremy Sisto ... Jackson Meiks
Maggie Gyllenhaal ... Helen Adams
Jordan Ladd ... Tiffany Leigh
Jacob Kogan ... Junior Meiks

Tagline: “One Only Sees Truth When They Have Faith”

Plot:

The car flipped four times before arriving at a halt. Due to the impact of the road and his head, Jackson suffers from a third degree brain hemorrhage. His son, Junior, dies in the hospital a few hours after the accident. Jackson leaves the hospital four months later only to dedicate the next three month after to Christianity. His friend Helen arrives every Sunday morning, giving Jackson a ride to church where Jackson spends his best time asking his Lord to forgive him. Jackson feels at fault for Junior's death. Helen, dedicating herself as much to helping Jackson as possible, offering him dinners after church and even allowing him to move into her house. Jackson, however, decides to remain in his apartment alone.

Jackson's younger sister Tiffany, a fractured woman that has carelessly lead her own life toward a commitment to heroin, breaks Jackson's self-isolation when she asks to stay a week. She tells him its because she is ready to get her life back on track, but Jackson can tell that its for a more dark, secretive reason. He does allow her to, feeling that its the right thing to do.

Tiffany keeps herself on a very destructive schedule. An emotionless vampire, she sleeps during the day, and disappears from the apartment during the night, and Jackson can only feel low for Tiffany. Tiffany returns home one night with a friend of hers. The two shoot up in Jackson's bathroom. Jackson acts as if he is clueless of what they were doing. And it is on this night, while Jackson prepares to go to bed, that he sees a man in his window. A man that eerily resembles Jesus Christ. The man just stares, and Jackson does as well. He walks away. Arriving and peering out the window to view his vacant snow-covered front yard.

The next day, after watching Tiffany and her girl pal sleep it away on his living room floor, he eats dinner with Helen and tells her of his visitation. Helen, sort of worried about her friend, goes along with Jackson's story and tells him that “its a turn of faith and a sign that God has your back. I feel there is no other solution to this situation than that.” Later that night, Tiffany leaves for the night. While remaining in his bedroom playing oldie records, Jackson is visited once again. Only this time, its not Jesus. It is his son Junior.

Junior tells Jackson that a dark and demonic force is moving in on him and his home. The dark force, as Junior explains, is an invisible predator and it lurks deep within Tiffany. And this force needs to be destroyed to not only help Jackson and his own soul, but to keep Tiffany from serving a terrible fate at the hands of Satan. And it is on this Saturday night that Tiffany comes home, emotionless and altered by drugs and alcohol. She curses at Jackson, hits him, and blames him for past family circumstances. With a simple appearance of Junior leading him to a kitchen knife, Jackson slashes and stabs at his baby sister, until she gasps her last breath on the kitchen floor.

Helen arrives the next morning, expecting Jackson to exit his apartment for church. Strangely, and unlike him, he doesn't come out. Helen knocks at the screen door, the main door remaining open for he to see the living room. Jackson doesn't arrive to the door, and Helen, decides to go in and see if he is alright. Walking through the living room and into the kitchen, Helen is terrified at the sight of blood. On the floor, the puddles enthrall an immediate reaction to her subconscious. She takes out her cell phone and calls the police. And it is not until after the phone call that Helen begins to hear a faint voice coming from the bedroom. Walking down the hallway she finds her way to the bedroom. A vague sight startles her as she makes a yelp and stares at Jackson, who sits on her bed, covered in blood, his little sister's head lying in his lap. He brushes her blood-stained blonde hair. He stares into space, slurring and mumbling the Lord's prayer. Helen becomes ached with terror. She slowly shuts the door.

What the Press Would Say:

Eli Roth, best known for his graphic holds-no-bars horror films, has bravely constructed a horror film of a different kind. Brilliantly constructing his character, Roth buries deep within sorrow and guilt as he fabricates Jackson Meiks, a tragically blistered soul who begins a rampant change toward personal weakness as he begins to fall into a depressive state. Roth is intelligent in his screenplay, structuring this character into a completely authentic and realistic situation, and Roth brings this character to brilliant depths by casting Jeremy Sisto as Jackson. Sisto is a completely deep actor who finds great emotional depths in his character. A greatly executed performance, Sisto never backs down from reaching into terrifying complexities of Jackson and in the end, gives the film an astounding sense of human weakness. In a scene when dead son Junior reappears to him, Sisto portrays so much emotion with a single tear drop and subtly creates a sense of love rediscovered. A truly great sequence showing an underrated actor in a fluently and authentically developed performance. In an unforgettably comfortable portrayal, Maggie Gyllenhaal portrays Jackson's friend Helen with a great deal of life. She seems like a down-to-earth woman that is there for her friend and in hopes of helping keep foot of him. In her scenes with Jackson she shows care. In the final scene in Jackson's apartment, she brings focus not only to terror, but of pity. The final shot of her expression as she realizes Jackson's mind has lost momentum and closing the bedroom door is exceptionally acted, with Gyllenhaal bringing so much to the screen in such little time. A true woman is brought to the screen through Gyllenhaal's portrayal. As for writer/director Eli Roth, it is clear that he is capable of creating a greater and more complex horror film, that doesn't rely only on its terror, but on its character, whose loss of conviction with himself brings him down to his mental unstableness at the film's climax. A truly masterful direction by a director who deftly understands his genre. A terrific, emotionally devastating, and ultimately saddening psychological horror story has finally been told – and to perfection.

For Your Consideration:

Best Picture
Best Director – Eli Roth
Best Original Screenplay
Best Actor – Jeremy Sisto
Best Supporting Actress – Maggie Gyllenhaal

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