BREEDER | Official Trailer \ufeff| Independent Film Company<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\nPOSITIVES<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you need any further proof of Youtube’s dominance inside of the horror genre, consider that Goyette, a content creator turned feature length filmmaker, is now the eighth member of the club to accomplish this feat, and with ‘Breeder’ being a film that is driven by such a fascinatingly unique concept, it proves him capable of compelling an audience in the most twistedly provocative of ways, making this a can’t miss thriller with plenty of substance beneath its shrieks. For starters, the film isn’t what I would consider horror in the traditional sense, but rather in the terrifying circumstances of its protagonist’s dreaded disposition, where the underlining truth beneath an already tense and uncomfortable surface gives way to an ultimate what if? scenario that allows its audience ample wiggle room to project themselves into such a situation, with a meaningfully fleshed out motivation that justifies the means of exploiting the opportunity with eagerness and determinative drive. While the big reveal itself is worthy of secrecy, I can coherently assess that the horror of the material utilizes thought-provoking substance in the form of the societal hypocrisies pertaining to animal breeding, where the awkwardness of traditional procedures and genetic modifications evokes a dissection on morality that articulates the helplessness of these innocent creatures, providing more honorable awareness than expected for a movie with the intentions of merely entertaining a paying audience. On that front too, the movie succeeds in spades, not only with a highly compelling opening act that revels in the ambiguity of its aforementioned plot device, but also one that crafts a scintillating slow-burn full of atmospheric anxiousness, where Goyette does his best directing while fleshing out the vulnerabilities associated with an outsider’s perspective among unfamiliar territory, featuring an abundance of commanding presentational quality that keeps this film from feeling cheap or limited in its execution. Everything from meticulous movements of the lens, to the lighting and framing, to even the erratic inconsistencies in the editing gifts audiences a disorienting insecurity that thrives impatiently among the presence of strangers, where immediately we sense an indescribably off-putting tension about what’s presented in front of us, and while Goyette and his production mostly keep their hands clean with regards to graphic imagery or gruesome bloodshed, he instead revels in the helpless resonance of Russell’s isolation from the outside world, making every second immensely difficult to leave, as a result of the power dynamic persisting between him and Patti. While the performances go a long way towards intensifying these characters with depravity and desperation, the dimensionality of the dialogue articulates perceptive impulses long before the curtain-jerking reveals ever have a chance to, where Patti’s dialect towards Russell and her surrounding daughters pertain to that of a person interacting gushingly with an animal, allowing the air of her demands to initially come across as surreally hilarious for how abnormal they feel from one human to another, before evolving into something darker and more assertive once a deal has been made between them. Because the plot enacts a lot of questions from such a fascinatingly unique idea, there is a feeling of the dialogue talking directly to the audience, with regards to backstory exposition that is unavoidably heavy-handed at times, however Goyette leaves enough speculative emphasis to the structure of these conversations that allow for triumphant realization from the audience long before the biggest of reveals of come to fruition, and it’s in that luring ability where Alex finds a connective link that further allows them to project themselves directly into the thick air of intriguing mystery that continuously hangs overhead within this ominous setting, surmising an abundance of compelling questions along the way, to which the writer\/director answers during the moments when their impacts can be felt the loudest. Aside from daring direction and a gripping screenplay, the film’s most admirable quality definitely pertains to the practices of its prominent performances, with Daniel Doheny and especially Dot-Marie Jones handing in stellar work that renders insight into the power dynamics of their overnight partnership. Physically, Doheny’s casting goes a long way towards fleshing out the vulnerability of Russell’s inescapability, with his petiteness and timid trepidation feeling victimized by Patti’s herculean frame and assertive dominance, but emotionally Doheny sells the magnitude of the maniacal mayhem intensely behind each expansive discovery, appraising urgency and especially vulnerability to Russell’s paranoia and plight, granting redeemable empathetic value to a character who doesn’t always act with his mind over his wallet. But it’s Jones’ mesmerizingly commanding turn that ultimately anchors the movie’s bizarre premise with a powerful onscreen presence, both in the undeterred air of Patti’s ‘Matter-of-fact’ deadpan delivery, which perfectly balances the terrifying suspense within the movie’s cringe-inducing dark humor, but also the restless psychology of the character’s tortured backstory driving the emotional instability of her portrayal, providing an overdue leading-lady triumph for one of sitcom television’s most dominating figures, in ways that take ample opportunity of her unshakeable presence dominating every frame.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
NEGATIVES<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While ‘Breeder’ is a blast of bizarreness that finds uncomfortable methods of tapping into the appeal of its horror hound audience, it isn’t without glaring flaws to the detriment of Goyette’s inexperience, particularly an abundance of contrivances and especially conveniences that require a lot of leniency logistically from the audience to buy outright. Sometimes it pertains to the questionable actions of the characters deliberately prolonging their own conflicts, while other times it involves hilariously hokey resolutions that require everything to perfectly transpire in order for a character to effectively evade threats to their own mortality, and while Goyette’s intended direction does render some pallet-cleansing laughs among the dark and hefty material, the writing occasionally falls into absurd territory, where the least likeliest of scenarios is often the means to several unfitting ends, paving the way for a clumsy climax that wastes away too much of the manifested momentum from a brilliant opening half. To be fair, while the writing doesn’t allow creatively for a lot of wiggle room from a predictably telegraphed finale, it’s made unsatisfying by a long-winded resolution that attempts to answer far too many of its distant questions, without any semblance of a meaningfully physical confrontation that provides satisfying reprieve to some of these character arcs, and considering so much of the third act already relegates itself to jarring time jumps that distances us to the depths of devastation, there’s plenty to be desired with how it capitalizes on the urgency of its instincts, leaving its most memorable moments extinguished by sequencing that evens the deck between its characters a bit more than necessary. Finally, with the thematic impulses of the film tapping into some darkly disturbing corridors, there’s some unforeseen restraint in Goyette’s direction to brandish intense body horror to breed visceral to the visuals, providing the only example where the limitations of the budget finally intrude on the appeal of its execution. Whether or not the gruesomely grotesque was the kind of film that Goyette was initially going for, there’s no denying that these fascinating ideas aren’t explored extensively to enact the extent of its entailing horror, instead approaching them conversely on the surface level, without any kind of elaborating circumstance to further the intense moments of distress, and with so many of these incarcerated moments relying heavily on dark comedy, suspense, and a deliberately slow pace rather than gory violence, there’s a keen sense of underwhelming emphasis to the extent of its tragic memorability, keeping Goyette and his production from ever taking full advantage of such a naturally unpleasant thematic dissection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
OVERALL
‘Breeder’ is a darkly disturbing psychological thriller that benefits exceptionally from not only the atmospheric creepiness of Alex Goyette’s daring direction reveling in the atmospheric ambiguity of its encompassing mystery, but also an all-timer of a performance from Dot-Marie Jones, whose uncompromising assertiveness gifts Patti with the kind of spine-tingling terror that makes audiences squirm in their seats. Despite the pleasantries, the film’s riddled conveniences and climactic clumsiness leaves its memorability a bit unrealized from where the movie initially began, conflicting only momentarily from an otherwise promising outlook from another of Youtube’s horror auteurs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
My Grade: 7.4 or B-<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Directed By Alex Goyette Starring – Dot-Marie Jones, Daniel Doheny, Maddie Phillips The Plot – An eccentric poodle breeder (Dot-Marie Jones) lures a broke college student (Doheny) to her remote ranch with a promise of research funding. But, as he soon learns, there’s a catch. Rated R for disturbing material, violence\/bloody images, sexual content, graphic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10015,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[16,20],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10014"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10014"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10014\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10016,"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10014\/revisions\/10016"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thefilmfreak.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}