“There’s no way for me to show you the things that I can tell you.”
I don’t think anyone saw this coming, but Blumouse has quietly become one of the most progressive studios making films today. While not as acclaimed as critical darling A24, Blumhouse’s films are far more diverse, as they center around women (The Invisible Man, both Happy Death Day movies); middle-aged people (Ma, the second two Insidious films); and, most prominently, Black talent. The most famous Blumhouse movie is undoubtedly Get Out, which helped legitimize the company with its Best Picture nomination and Best Screenplay win, but with other films like Us and Sweetheart, the studio is clearly willing to take a chance on recontextualizing horror and how it treats Black bodies and Black experiences. Sweetheart isn’t perfect, but it feels like there is passion put into every scene.
Sweetheart unfolds with admirable economy. We know that there has been a shipwreck, and we know that Jenn (Kiersey Clemons) seems to be the only survivor. So the film starts with Jenn washing up on shore. Sweetheart lets much of its plot exist in insinuation; for instance, when another survivor asks Jenn, right before he dies, “Did you see it?” It’s a line that won’t make sense for a while, but points to the possible cause of the shipwreck.
For a while, Jenn just explores the island. Sweetheart, for a mainstream horror movie, is surprisingly artful, as it allows Clemons full command of the screen without a word of dialogue. It’s easy to root for Jenn: she’s resourceful, determined, and doesn’t spend time in denial. She realizes she’s trapped and knows she has to deal with it. One-person movies are a tightrope walk, and your star has to finesse it. Oftentimes, that’s done with an excuse for the character to talk and explicate: John Cusack and his recorder in 1408; Will Smith and his dog in I Am Legend; Ryan Reynolds and his phone in Buried. Clemons doesn’t need any of that. Sweetheart, at its core, has the soul of an indie movie – I mean, where else are you going to find a relatively unknown actress with barely any dialogue?
Of course, she’s not alone. It would be a pretty boring horror movie if that were the case. First Jenn finds three little cairns with initials on them. Then there are signs of something living off of the coast, namely what looks like a black hole in the seabed. It’s a good image, and one that will give you a little jolt of thalassophobia. We see its inhabitant: a tall amphibious creature that is without a doubt very carnivorous. The monster design isn’t all that great; it looks like a more leonine version of the creature from The Shape of Water. Whatever you’re picturing, you’re probably correct. Luckily, director J.D. Dillard (who also wrote) keeps the monster off screen as much as he can, making Sweetheart into a fun inversion of Jaws, where the monster hunts on land instead of on the ocean.
So far, so mostly successful monster movie. It’s with the introduction of two other survivors, Mia and Lucas, that Sweetheart really finds its footing. Right away, something about them seems off. Lucas is Jenn’s boyfriend, but seems to have gotten awful close to Mia. Or how much of that is in Jenn’s sun-baked mind? The movie doesn’t clarify. They don’t believe her about the monster, which is understandable in these kinds of movies, but it’s the way that they disbelieve that is so maddening, both for Jenn and the viewer. It’s at this point that the movie becomes a commentary on race in America, which is not what you expect from an island monster movie.
Mia and Lucas, both white, condescend to Jenn in every scene. Every time Lucas calls her “Sweetheart,” it gets more grating and infantilizing. This is a Black woman trying to warn you of danger, a danger that she has personally experience, and all you can do is dismiss it, because you haven’t seen it and therefore it doesn’t apply to your life? To say nothing of the fact that at one point Jenn literally has to escape from makeshift handcuffs, or the fact that the monster is effectively trapping Jenn on land, a pretty clear metaphor for segregation.
Sweetheart isn’t subtle about this, but that doesn’t make it less effective. When Lucas tells Jenn, “I pay for your life,” his tone and his message is not very far off from something a slave owner would say. It’s an interesting, powerful twist, and by far the most successful part of the movie, due in no small part to Clemons’ performance. It’s just a shame that Emory Cohen is playing Lucas, because Cohen (who is not a bad actor overall) is just dreadful in the part. I won’t heap adjectives on top of that. He’s just bad.
It’s not enough to derail the movie, though. We’ve been with Jenn for this long and we’re rooting for her. I won’t go into too much more plot recitation, because I recommend that you watch this movie. I will say that it ends about how you’d expect. For too long, white ears have been deaf to Black voices, and that’s finally starting to (slowly) come around. If I weren’t listening already, Sweetheart would be shouting at me. And that’s absolutely meant as a compliment.
Thursday, 10/1: Phantasm
Friday, 10/2: Frozen
Saturday, 10/3: Suspiria
Sunday, 10/4: Suspiria (2018)
Monday, 10/5: Emelie
Tuesday, 10/6: Castle Freak
Wednesday, 10/7: Session 9
Thursday, 10/8: The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2
Friday, 10/9: We Are Still Here
Saturday, 10/10: The Changeling
Sunday, 10/11: The Bad Seed
Monday, 10/12: Verotika
Tuesday, 10/13: The Legend of Hell House
Wednesday, 10/14: Lake Mungo
Thursday, 10/15: Puppetmaster
Friday, 10/16: Marrowbone
Saturday, 10/17: A Nightmare on Elm Street 4: The Dream Master
Sunday, 10/18: Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers
Monday, 10/19: Sweetheart
Tuesday, 10/20: Girl On the Third Floor
Wednesday, 10/21: Behind the Mask: The Rise of Leslie Vernon
Thursday, 10/22: Triangle
Friday, 10/23: Dog Soldiers
Saturday, 10/24: Noroi: The Curse
Sunday, 10/25: Train to Busan
Monday, 10/26: Tales From the Hood
Tuesday, 10/27: Mandy
Wednesday, 10/28: Sometimes They Come Back
Thursday, 10/29: Veronica
Friday, 10/30: The Wicker Man
Saturday, 10/31: Child’s Play
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