(There will be minor spoilers in this but no major ones. Also, apologies for the length. I loved this movie and I guess I like to talk about it)
Yesterday, I saw Crimson Peak (2015, Mia Wasikowska, Tom Hiddleston, Jessica Chastain). First off, IT WAS AMAZING. I loved it. I've never seen a horror movie before but decided the interviews with the cast and director where they insist it's more gothic romance than horror convinced me that I could brave this in order to see Tom Hiddleston (one always needs more Hiddles in your life).
I believe it can be best summed up like this: naive American, handsome Brit, creepy sister, loads of ghosts.
(Full disclosure: Part way through writing this I realized I was using "creepy" in every other sentence. Rather than edit and get creative with word choice I continued writing. After I finished, I replaced some of them with creepy synonyms that were suggested by thesaurus.com. Please enjoy)
So, a synopsis: Edith Cushing (Mia Wasikowska, you might know her from the 2011 Jane Eyre or the 2010 Tim Burton Alice in Wonderland) is an aspiring young American novelist who wishes to be more like Mary Shelley, who died a widow, than Jane Austen, who died a spinster. She says as much to a forgettable yet annoying character. She doesn't say so, but given that she gets told by her would be publisher that she should write a romance instead of her "ghost story" (she insists it's a story with a ghost in it), I can't help noticing that she aspires to Mary-certainly a ghost writer, rather than Jane-a romance writer.
Edith's father is an industrialist who worked his way up to fortune. Her mother died of black cholera when Edith** was young. After the funeral, her mother came back to creepily warn her to "beware of Crimson Peak."
Years later, Edith is an adult. She believes in ghosts and writes about them. While typing her novel, a handsome British stranger comes across her. The man introduces himself as Sir Thomas Sharpe (Tom Hiddleston. You know him as Loki and all around real life Disney prince. He is too sweet and charming for his own good), a baronet. His sister, Lucille (Jessica Chastain, you may recognize her from The Martian, Zero Dark Thirty, and Interstellar) is severe, beautiful, wears red marvelously, and kind of creepy.
After Mr. Cushing is murdered by a black gloved attacker (but the characters don't realize it's murder), Edith marries her handsome stranger (who definitely feels a little dangerous in a "everyone will fall in love anyway" kind of way. Like a more mysterious Guy of Gisborne from the BBC Robin Hood or, well, the handsome guy in a gothic romance....) and moves to his home in England.
The house is big, it is falling apart, and it is sinister. Lucille (who is referred to as Lady Lucille throughout the movie even though the children of baronets don't get curtesy titles. Fun fact. I do have a wrought-with-spoilers theory about why it artistically makes sense to do this though, so I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt) gets more disturbing and weird when they get home and refuses to give Edith a set of house keys.
Edith begins to experience all kinds of creepiness (which is constantly written off by her husband and sister in law, but it's not fully clear if they are purposefully gas-lighting her) which is made creepier by All The Fricking Clay. The house has a red clay depository (I'm now making up the language of clay mining. Please forgive me if you are a clay expert) and the red rises to the surface. There are parts of the house where the red oozes between the boards of the floor and runs down the walls. It's macabre. It's clay, not blood, but it still looks like it. When Edith first takes a bath, Thomas warns her that the water runs red before the clay clears from the pipes. It's weird and it's creepy. It's like the house bleeds.
Eventually Edith learns too much and her childhood friend shows up (having learned some things about the Sharpes). This launches events into over drive and the movie has it's climax.
So, how was this movie, really? Well, let's start with the obvious: despite what the makers would have you believe, it is absolutely a horror movie. There are ghosts. They jump out at you. I sat with my scarf balled up in my lap and kept scrunching it to my face, all ready to close my eyes. It was scary. It was eerie.
It was also fantastic. Guillermo Del Toro wrote and directed and of course he is marvelous. The visuals are absolutely stunning. They actually built the full house with a working elevator (I got really irritated every time the characters would stick their head into the elevator shaft though. Do they know nothing about elevator safety?? Also, I'm super sad because they built the house on a soundstage and had to tear it down after the shoot to make space). And then there are the colors. THE COLORS. There was so much red, which is great and makes sense. Red is usually sex, danger, and sometimes love (but kind of depends on the shade). Perfect for this. All the red of course is super obvious but it was done SO deliberately. I didn't notice during the movie but IMDB has since informed me that the only characters who wear red are the Sharpes and it never occurs in the sets except for the house and the estate. That's absolutely brilliant.
As a costumer type, I loved the wardrobe choices. Both Sharpe siblings dress incredibly well (but their clothes are just a touch shabby). Thomas wears nearly all black while Lucille wears incredibly rich, vibrant but dark colors, especially red. She is wearing red when we meet her and wears it often later as well. Edith, on the other hand, has clothes that are much newer (her family has money *right now*) and her colors are much fresher, younger, and lighter. Edith is blonde, the Sharpes are both dark haired. The juxtaposition could not be plainer.
Now: the acting.
Holy cow, these people are like gods. Mia Wasikowska was naive and innocent and curious and brilliant. Tom Hiddleston was dark and mysterious and completely someone you could fall very dangerously for. Jessica Chastain was basically a giant ball of perfect. She was terrifying and horrific and her character completely believed everything she said.
But here's the thing that got me: I FORGAVE TOM HIDDLESTON'S CHARACTER AT THE END.
Without giving more spoilers than what you otherwise might have predicted, Thomas Sharpe is absolutely in on the creepiness. He knows what's up. He is lying, he is watching his sister connive and scheme, but I still left the theater thinking he is a perfect little cinnamon roll.
That got me thinking, is it the character or is it the Hiddles himself? I think it's the Hiddles. Benedict Cumberbatch was originally cast in the Thomas Sharpe role but pulled out for unknown reasons (he has stated that everything is still good between Guillermo Del Toro and him), so I started thinking about other Hiddleston and Cabbagepatch characters. I typically think Loki is redeemable while Khan is less so. I love Billiardball Frumblesnatch and he plays dark magnificently well but I don't find myself falling in love with his characters and insisting that they're "just misunderstood" the way I do for Tom.
I don't have an answer for this, by the way, it's just my question: what is it about Tom Hiddleston that makes his despicable characters lovable? Richard Armitage is similar, his dark and dangerous characters (like Guy from Robin Hood) are still people you want to fall in love with. With Richard, I think it comes from his marvelous angst (best demonstrated as John Thornton in North and South, 2004. Also as Thorin in the Hobbit franchise) but Hiddles doesn't get angsty the same way. He is just straight up lovable, I think. I wonder if maybe knowing what he is like out of character (incredibly sweet, polite, and basically a perfect little ball of awww) influences how I watch him, except I was late to the Hiddles train and had seen (and loved) Loki long before I saw all his adorable interviews. I really think it's something else.
And I'm not the only one who thinks so: there is footage, I think from ComicCon (maybw 2014? Now that I'm talking about it I can't find the video) of Guillermo Del Toro saying that people could find Tom Hiddleston in an alley grinding puppies and they would still just go "awwwww." It's completely true. It's like the man can do no wrong. It is baffling and marvelous and now I need to go rewatch every Hiddles movie ever so I can attempt to comprehend what is going with his characters.
Final judgement? 10/10 would recommend. The creep factors are well demonstrated in the trailers, so you're pretty well prepared there. There is also some violence that is not in the trailers but is not overly gory (plenty of blood though, but all incredibly deliberate. Less Tarantino, more... I dunno, someone artsy and ruthless). The big question, though, is it horror or gothic romance? Meh. I don't know that the distinction is important. If your worry (like mine) of horror movies is it's a lot of scary without a lot of explanation while gothic romance is a lot of scary but with a plot and everything explained, than this is gothic romance. But it is scary so don't go into this thinking it won't be. It's plenty scary, but it's good.
*obligatory special shout out to my friends who came to see it with me and only laughed at me a little when I commented that Tom Hiddleston had taken my horror movie virginity*
**Stupid language complaint. I wanted this sentence to be "Her mother died...when she was young," but then it's not clear whether I mean Edith or her mother was young. Grumble.
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