‘Malignant’ Review: A Gruesome Farce
I have never seen a James Wan horror movie until Malignant, which probably makes me one of the least qualified people to review the latest entry from the contemporary king of horror. But here we are.
Malignant, currently in theaters and available on HBO Max, follows a woman who is tortured by dreams and visions of grisly murders, which end up coming true, murders that all involve victims lonely connected to her. I won’t spoil the twists, since they are batshit insane, but I was able to figure things out fairly early on in the way of thinking, “boy, it sure would be stupid if XYZ is the twist” and then it was the twist. The story has a supernatural/sci-fi/medical drama flavor to it but is essentially a kind of modern giallo movie complete with all the hallmarks of those classic Italian horror movies: a black gloved, silhouetted killer who seems all-powerful, mental illness, dual identities, an intense pace, and bombastic use of color, music, and atmosphere. In some sense, the movie seems to be Wan’s send-up of the giallo genre.
As for the movie’s quality, it is pretty bad. Many of the scares are effective, and Wan is an energetic and inventive technician as a director, but that’s about all the praise I can muster. The script is borderline nonsensical and when it is coherent, it’s riddled with cliches, to the point that it’s hard to know whether the whole thing is one big joke or not. Everyone is white, but the one black woman in the movie is a steretypically no-nonsense cop whose only job is to state the obvious and fulfill all the requirements her stock character type demands. Most characters continually state the obvious, re-state what others have just said, or explain to the viewer what just happened in some of the most blatant spoon-feeding I’ve seen in quite some time. The performances are serviceable, but often laughable due to the continual mismatch between the movie’s dialogue, performance, and visual aesthetic. There’s a huge action setpiece near the end of the movie that, while neat, seems totally out of place. The violence is cartoonish to where it has no weight at all, and seems largely inconsequential. The music is horribly on the nose, featuring a comically reworked sadcore version of The Pixies’ Where is My Mind. In general the movie can’t seem to decide whether it wants to be a creepy horror movie or a loud and ostentatious thriller. It’s a mess, through and through. I found myself cracking up multiple times at Malignant’s paradoxical nature, being simultaneously cliched to the point of being predictable as well as awe inspiringly ridiculous.
I know Wan is generally very well regarded as a filmmaker and I know plenty of people who swear by The Conjuring and The Conjuring 2 as excellent films, but my interest in seeing those definitely took a hit after watching Malignant. Wan’s technique aside, Malignant is exceedingly average and often quite bad, with its worst qualities maximized due to the loud, in-your-face bombast that runs throughout. If you are a huge fan of either James Wan or Italian horror movies from the 1970s, then maybe check out Malignant. Otherwise don’t bother.
