A Cure For Wellness - Movie Review
Rating: 2.5 out of 5
It's no surprise that this creep-out horror thriller is packed with whizzy visual invention, since it's directed by Gore Verbinski, who made the first three Pirates of the Caribbean movies, as well as Rango and The Lone Ranger. And the screenplay by Justin Haythe (Revolutionary Road) starts well, stirring in some resonant themes amid the growing, gnawing nastiness. Unfortunately, over the film's overlong running time, it just gets sillier and simpler.
The story centres on Lockhart (Dane DeHaan), a rising star workaholic New York broker who's been caught in some dodgy dealings. To redeem himself, he is sent to collect the company's boss (Harry Groener) from a Swiss sanatorium, where he seems to have gone native. Or something. But when Lockhart arrives at the picturesque Alpine castle, things quickly begin to spiral out of control. He's injured in a car crash, forcing him to become a patient at the spa alongside the rather too-cheerful elderly residents, who are undergoing some sort of odd treatment. As Lockhart digs deeper, he runs afoul of the director, Dr Volmer (Jason Isaacs), especially when he befriends the doctor's star patient, the oddly naive Hannah (Mia Goth). And as things get freakier, Lockhart begins to worry that he'll never get out of here.
Verbinski develops a darkly gothic atmosphere from the first frames of the film, and things get increasingly offbeat from there. Some elements are blackly comical, but the overall tone is grotesque, with a special emphasis on slimy eels, which appear alarmingly everywhere Lockhart looks. Meanwhile, Haythe stirs in a convoluted mythology about the mad baron who lived in the castle 200 years earlier. When combined with underlying themes about the stresses of modern-day life and the relative morality of Wall Street bankers, this is all rather intriguing. Unfortunately, these clever textures slip away quickly, leaving little more than a series of repetitive set pieces designed to give the audience the jitters as they remind us of other movies.
Much of what happens is genuinely cringe-worthy, but the effect is badly watered down by the movie's increasingly shallowness. DeHaan and Goth are intriguing enough to hold the interest, and Isaacs is superbly menacing right up until his character crosses a line. But it's all played far too seriously, bogging down so badly in the murky plot that it becomes impossible to care what happens next. It looks good enough to hold the attention, and some of the gross-out moments are truly unnerving. But without a sense of momentum or purpose, these are empty thrills.
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Facts and Figures
Year: 2017
Genre: Horror/Suspense
Run time: 146 mins
In Theaters: Friday 17th February 2017
Box Office Worldwide: $9.5M
Budget: $40M
Distributed by: 20th Century Fox
Production compaines: Studio Babelsberg, Regency Enterprises, New Regency Pictures, TSG Entertainment, Blind Wink Productions
Reviews
Contactmusic.com: 2.5 / 5
Rotten Tomatoes: 35%
Fresh: 11 Rotten: 20
IMDB: 7.4 / 10
Cast & Crew
Director: Gore Verbinski
Producer: Arnon Milchan, Gore Verbinski, David Crockett
Screenwriter: Justin Haythe
Starring: Dane DeHaan as Mr. Lockhart, Jason Isaacs as Volmer, Mia Goth as Hannah, Douglas Hamilton as 9-Year-Old Lockhart, Adrian Schiller as Deputy Director, Celia Imrie as Victoria Watkins, Ashok Mandanna as Ron Nair, Harry Groener as Pembroke, Godehard Giese as Prim Technician, Tomas Norström as Frank Hill, Angelina Häntsch as Volmer Institute Staff, Jeff Burrell as Funeral Director, Annette Lober as Volmer Institute Staff, Eric Todd as Josh, Christian Brauer as Technician, Thomas Richter as Water Trainer, Chris Huszar as Wedding Guest, Marko Buzin as Wedding Guest, Ivo Nandi as Enrico, Magnus Krepper as Pieter The Vet, Peter Benedict as Constable, Michael Mendl as Bartender, Maggie Steed as Mrs. Abramov, Craig Wroe as Morris, David Bishins as Hank Green, Lisa Banes as Hollis, Carl Lumbly as Mr. Wilson, Tom Flynn as Humphrey, Jason Babinsky as Carl, Johannes Krisch as Caretaker, Rebecca Street as Lockhart's Mother, Susanne Wuest as Volmer Institute Staff
Also starring: Tomas Norstrom, Arnon Milchan, Gore Verbinski, Justin Haythe