Yet another low budget horror featuring children as paranormal beings.
Well, let’s relish the horrid children once again, shall we? If you enjoyed The Omen, Children Of The Corn, and Eli, you may be interested in this movie as it has Elliot, a small child who gradually starts to display some odd-looking behaviours during the flow of this rather clichéd horror story.
Him, a twin whose other half, if we believe the story, died in a car accident, is the son of mother Rachel played by Teresa Palmer and father Anthony, played by Steven Cree who moved with their young son to a small Finnish city to nurse the wounds from the loss of their child in an auto violence.
Do they live happily ever after? No. Of course not. As I have already referenced above about Elliot being strange, it is clear that their life improved very little after they relocated to the new place. Almost immediately upon their arrival, unusual events began to occur, both inside and outside the house for Rachel and her unfortunte family.
To begin with, the other residents are quite a ‘moody’ lot. This is less worrying for Anthony sincehe was born in the town, but forRachel, the hostile stares of her odious neighbors at a party they go to are sufficient to make her quite jumpy.
Life at home isn’t quite pleasant for Rachel as well as she begins having bad dreams regarding Nathan, her other son, and the nightmarish situations that have besieged her family. Her daytime is as much of a bad dream as Elliot begins not only talking to an imaginary figure of his deceased sibling but also becoming overtaken by the very image. Thereafter, disturbing drawings that hint at Rachel’s death are made by him.
The Twin is indeed a horror film that resonates with the other earlier films such as the presence of creepy possessor townspeople. It is somewhere in between Midsommar and Rosemary’s Baby but any number of other films, including the ones referred to at the beginning of this review, are also applicable here.
Is it any good? Not really, no. Not that there aren’t any positives though. Director and screenplay writer Taneli Mustonen is able to create a sense of dread through some very interesting camera touches with a suitable score. Teresa Palmer, well known for her horror films Warm Bodies and Lights Out, earns herself praise for convincingly portraying a mother who believes her son and neighbours have turned against her. Tristan Ruggeri the boy who plays Elliot, still has a long way to go before he reaches the terrifying standards set by Harvey Stephens as the young Damien in The Omen.
Alas, the movie ends up collapsing from the weight of its own story. It blatantly is a horror movie but at a deeper level, it’s stalked by an inner drama where a woman is gradually breaking down because of her loss. The issue doesn’t stem from this type of genre mixing as other films have successfully blended them like The Babadook and Hereditary but The Twin does not have a sufficiently strong narrative to bring all these the elements into focus. The number of plots twists in this story is far too many for this story to be realistic and because plot twists mostly do not make sense, it all gets quite ridiculous.
Mentioning anything regarding the twists of the story would cross over into the spoiler zone so for those who have not seen the movie, you are in for some surprises. So let’s put it this way, if all you want is a half decent horror flick then this is not the place for you. Other than that, this film is a classic in the way that it literally contains all of the aspects of a film of this nature creepy little children, creepy houses, creepy witches, creepy dreams, lose some blood everything you ever wanted to see, sounds great in theory, does it not? Well, not really as there is just too many of everything and such a huge disappointment in the aftermath.
The fact that it turned out this way I can be rest assured and say it does not look very good. Some of the cinematography is excellent, it is obvious the director has some skill, and the plot has potential. They even have one jump scare that is somewhat reasonable and well done. Although the storyline is muddled about and trying to be different things at once, the writing is somewhat laughable with the ending as expected being more of an anticlimax. This should not be classified as a film to go see in the cinema however, rather a film to avoid.
If you are indeed willing to watch this movie regardless of its shortcomings, it is currently available for streaming on Shudder. Due to the certain positives that I have mentioned, it is not entirely a waste of time. On the other hand, if you expect a scary experience, like some of the others mentioned in this article including Hereditary and The Omen, you might as well avoid The Twin as these movies do what The Twin does a hundred times better.
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