We Can't Wait #6 - Crimson Peak
Saturday, March 14, 2015 at 6:00PM Team Experience is counting down our 15 most anticipated for 2015. Here's Jason...
Who & What: Guillermo Del Toro directs a script he co-wrote with Matthew Robbins (the two have worked together several times but Robbins' most important credit is clearly having directed the seminal-to-me The Legend of Billie Jean - "Fair is fair!"); British playwright Lucinda Coxon (who also wrote the script for the upcoming The Danish Girl) was brought in to add "the proper degree of perversity and intelligence" to the tale.
Mia Wasikowska plays an aspiring novelist named Edith Cushing (I have to share the character names, they're too juicy not to) who gets swept off her feet by the dashing and dark Sir Thomas Sharpe (played by the dashing and dark Tom Hiddleston) and subsequently carried off to his sinister Gothic mansion full all of the requisite spires and shadows with an incestuous-seeming Jessica Chastain as the Lady Lucille Sharpe sneaking amongst them. Charlie Hunnam plays an old friend of Edith's (named "Dr. Alan McMichael" and it doesn't get much more "decent" and "boring" and "doesn't stand a chance in hell" than that) who warns her against the lot of it.
Why We're Excited About it: Del Toro's said that this is his stab at making one of his small Spanish-language movies in English and, while I'll defend the Hellboys and Pacific Rim plenty, there's no denying his greatest works have been the smaller character-based oddities of The Devil's Backbone and Pan's Labyrinth. The list of influences he cites on Peak - The Haunting, The Innocents, and The Shining - are all the precise titles we want to hear mentioned, while at the same time he says his aim is to deconstruct our genre expectations. Plus the cast is as talented as they are gorgeous (which is to say plenty) and if you've watched the pitch-perfect trailer then you've seen the spectacular costumes (those poofy sleeves!) they're running up and down the haunted staircases in as a storm blows the curtains and the fireplace goes out and man oh man do I love me a good old-fashioned Gothic haunted house movie!
What if it all Goes Wrong? As small as Del Toro kept saying he wanted this movie to be, the trailer is BIG, full of CG ghosts rising through floors and sets seemingly built all the way up to the thunderstruck heavens - even if it's contained to mostly the titular house and grounds I do worry that the filmmaker's well-documented giddiness over his subject might've maybe carried him away on a storm-cloud of everything-but-the-haunted-kitchen-sink and we'll lose the characters underneath those gorgeous poofy sleeves.
When: Carve your pumpkins and throw on your best velvet cape and head straight to the theater - the movie hits right when the movie should, just in time for All Hallows. Universal's got it slated for October 16th in the US.
Previously...
#7 45 Years
#8 Bridge of Spies
#9 Taxi
#10 Freeheld
#11 A Bigger Splash
#12 The Dressmaker
#13 The Hateful Eight
#14 Knight of Cups
#15 Arabian Nights
Sidebar 3 Animated Films
Sidebar 2 Tomorrowland
Sidebar 1 Avengers: Age of Ultron
Intro Pick a Blockbuster
Reader Comments (16)
Will Chastain ever become a double nominee?
All the disparate parts should make this a big yes for me, but that trailer is leaving me cold. I feel I have seen it a thousand times (basic cable) and I'm going to need a bigger hook to get me in the door.
Even Guillermo del Toro's small films are visual explosions with lots of effects. I wouldn't worry about CGI ghosts. He goes for visual excess but tends to tell very clear stories at this scale.
I love the cast but I'm worried about the film because I didn't even like the trailer.
I know it sounds weird but Chastain feels miscast (if that's ever possible).
At the end of this year we'll be sticking out our measuring sticks comparing Mara's Carol performance to Mia's Crimson Peak delivery since Mia dropped out of Carol to do this.
This is in my top 5 most anticipated films of 2015. I really hope this will be Guillermo's year as he would win the Oscar as it would make it 3 Mexicans in a row. Arriba!
I'd be surprised if Rebecca wasn't an influence either, Chastain is serving up a lot of Mrs. Danvers in the trailer. And speaking of Chastain, I agree with Yavor that she feels a little miscast here, I think it's her line delivery that's throwing me off. I kept imagining Emily Blunt saying those words instead. But it's just a trailer and she has yet to let me down so I'm beyond optimistic.
I hope the effects aren't too CGI, great practical effects can make a world of difference in horror films. Don't Be Afraid of the Dark and Mama (both produced by Del Toro himself) would have benefitted greatly from more imaginative, less computer generated/cartoonish effects.
It's already clear from the trailer that this will be closer to the CGI-laden remake of The Haunting than the brilliance of the original The Haunting. The ghost in this one seems to be exactly like the ghost in Mama (i.e. over-the-top and unscary).
"Mama" the short was much more effective than the feature.
thefilmjunkie -- if Chastain has never let you down, avoid MISS JULIE. just saying.
I've watched this trailer 6 times now, trying to see what it is I am missing, but it just feels as if the 4 leads are working in different projects. I get no connection of style or even period from them. TH is mumbling everything, CH is too modern, Mia is MIA (just getting nothing from her) and Chastain is trying to chew the woodwork but getting her teeth caught in the curtains instead. I hope this is not representative of the film as a whole.
I know someone who saw a test screening of this and thought it was pretty forgettable, with Chastain (overacting) and Hiddleston (underacting) for most Razzie-worthy performance. And this assessment was coming from someone who thought Chastain deserved an Oscar nom for A Most Violent Year.
Can we agree now that Chastain is not the 2nd coming.I have been underwhelmed by her from Take Shelter onwards,what am I not getting.
This sounds uh-mazing. Can't wait. Jessica will kill it again.
Mark - Chastain was terrific in Take Shelter.
That's what I said from that film on.
@Nathaniel - I figured someone would bring that one up, but I have to admit I'm interested in seeing if it's as much of a disaster as some say.