DEATH OF ME (2020)

Studio:      Saban Films
Director:    Darren Lynn Bousman
Writer:      Ari Margolis, James Morley III, David Tish
Producer:  Lee Nelson, David Tish, Charles Dorfman
Stars:     Maggie Q, Alex Essoe, Ingkarat Jaraswongkosol, Kelly Bronwen Jones, Caledonia Burr, Luke Hemsworth

Review Score:

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Summary:

After waking up with no memory of what happened the night before, American tourists vacationing on a remote Thailand island learn they’ve become pawns in a mysterious ritual.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Vacationing on a remote Thailand island, Christine Oliver and her travel reporter husband Neil wake up in their disarrayed airbnb with no memory of what happened the night before. A TV news report mentions a typhoon approaching, even though the island hasn’t seen a storm in 200 years. Christine finds she is wearing an unusual necklace. With their passports, luggage, and Christine’s phone missing, the couple also discovers they are unable to ferry back to the mainland.

Neil finds a cellphone video of he and Christine drinking an unknown drink at a village bar run by Madee, who also puts the amulet around Christine’s neck. Afterward, Neil and Christine have aggressive sex that ends with Neil seemingly snapping Christine’s neck as though possessed and burying her in the ground. Shocked and confused by what the video apparently depicts, Christine suddenly vomits dirt and grass.

Samantha, the American expatriate who rented out her airbnb, returns with her daughter Nathida to find her house still occupied. Seeing Christine’s ill condition, Samantha sends Christine to see Dr. Anuman, who dismisses the strange video as fake while saying Christine simply took a Buddhist hallucinogen.

Christine begins having repeated blackouts and hallucinations where she sees faceless villagers with their eyes and mouths sewn shut. No matter where she leaves the amulet, someone always returns it to her neck. Christine pulls a small snake from her throat. She and Neil also observe odd festival ceremonies that seemingly feature Christine in effigy.

Neil and Christine bribe tattoo artist Kanda in order to find Madee. Madee only speaks cryptically about the necklace and hallucinogenic drink, which frustrates Christine further. Villagers strangely celebrate Christine with admiration.

Samantha’s fisherman friend supposedly offers to ferry the couple back to the mainland. While waiting on the pier, the fisherman puts Neil into a trance that compels Neil to disembowel himself with a knife. Christine blacks out right after seeing Neil’s body fall into the water.

Samantha helps Christine recover. Christine reports Neil’s disappearance, but the policeman and Samantha consider Christine’s claims to be crazy. Christine continues experiencing frightening hallucinations of corpses and faceless people. Christine discovers she has to wear the necklace to make her painful blackouts subside.

Samantha tries convincing Christine that Neil merely returned to the mainland alone because he was afraid of hurting Christine again. Samantha insists that Christine return to Dr. Anuman, who diagnoses Christine as pregnant. After a frightening image flashes on the sonogram, Christine flees the clinic before the doctor can inject her with a sedative.

Christine returns to Kanda. Kanda reveals Christine and Neil were manipulated into creating a new life. Christine now exists on a spiritual plane between life and death and the amulet maintains that balance while spirits prepare her for the final ritual. Kanda explains that superstitious villagers sacrifice pregnant women to keep the island safe. Kanda does not believe in the island’s gods and doesn’t think an unwilling sacrifice can stop the upcoming storm. However, she does believe in the amulet’s healing power. Christine offers to give Kanda the necklace to save her dying son if Kanda can help Christine escape the island.

Christine hides when Dr. Anuman comes to Kanda’s parlor. Anuman entrances Kanda so she kills herself with a tattoo needle.

Christine flees. Samantha offers to escort Christine to a ferry. However, Nathida reveals Samantha isn’t telling the truth. Samantha admits Nathida’s real mother was ritualistically sacrificed to protect the island and claims that the island’s magic cured Samantha of pancreatic cancer. Samantha further insists that Christine’s death is necessary to preserve the island’s people.

Christine suddenly uses a gun she took from Kanda to shoot Samantha in her head, which causes Samantha’s car to crash. Christine flees, but is captured by Madee and village cultists.

Tied to a post for the final ritual, Christine defies Madee’s suggestion that she offered herself freely while drunk at Madee’s bar. Dr. Anuman tells Christine that one part of her child comes from Neil and the other part comes from the island.

Christine fights back as villagers begin sewing her right eye shut. When Christine breaks free from her restraints, Nathida pleads that only Christine’s sacrifice can save the desperate villagers. Christine still runs and escapes the island on a motorized raft.

The typhoon devastates the island and wipes out its population. Rescuers find Christine drifting dead in her raft. However, Christine breathes back to life when she is zipped into a body bag with the amulet dropped on her chest.

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Review:

Horror has done a number on my already limited desire to vacation outside convenience or do any truly exotic travel. Preferring indoors to outdoors anyway, I have little interest in camping for instance because if fright films have taught me anything, it’s that nothing good ever happens in the woods.

Movies like “Death of Me” are a chief reason why I’m apprehensive about taking a holiday abroad. You’re at a disadvantage to begin with when you’re subject to unfamiliar laws in a land where you don’t speak the language. Lose your passport or cellphone service on top of that and you’re completely stripped of control in any unforeseen situation. “Death of Me” goes beyond tapping into that sense of unsafe helplessness. The movie fracks those fears with a massive rig that puts a miles-long pipeline between ‘stranger in a strange land’ phobias and vicarious psychological uncertainty.

Travel reporter Neil (Luke Hemsworth) brought his wife Christine (Maggie Q) along on an excursion to a tiny Thailand island. Their adventurous getaway turns into an alarming guessing game when the couple wakes one morning with total amnesia regarding whatever caused their bodies to become caked in dirt.

The elevator pitch for “Death of Me” was probably only four words. “The Hangover, but horror.” Except Christine and Neil’s circumstance is less about figuring out precisely what happened and more about uncovering what comes next as the present portion of their story progresses.

We’re in the mix of the mystery alongside the couple right from the get-go since “Death of Me” starts when they wake up. Viewers feel their immediate frustration because all of the information we have is all of the information they have too. Personal belongings are missing. A strange amulet sits around Christine’s neck. The TV talks about an approaching typhoon. Our eyes and their eyes soak in everything as a potential clue to solve a question no one even knows to ask yet.

After Christine and Neil realize they’re unable to leave without any identification, Neil finds a cellphone video recorded the night before. Footage depicts an impossible event neither he nor his wife can believe, even though it’s onscreen in front of them. Then Christine begins vomiting earthen items and experiencing haunting hallucinations. The pair quickly wonders if there might be as much of an unknown nightmare in front of them as there is behind them.

With breadcrumbs placed far apart on the trail of growing tension, “Death of Me” takes its time unspooling the story. Its secrets aren’t plentiful though, so the film spins in redundant crypticness that stretches suspense further than substance can fully sustain.

Yet you don’t necessarily notice the content’s sparseness because unsettling sound design and Christine’s constant visions won’t permit attention spans to wander. Long leers from villagers, rituals of hectic revelry, and sudden visual shocks level overall weirdness even when rhythm loses balance. “Death of Me” can get repetitive, particularly when Christine’s visions return to the same subjects over and over again. But the persistent strangeness of its sights and sounds turns “Death of Me” into an unnerving travelogue capable of roping attuned minds into paranoid dread.

Curious camerawork carves holes in the film’s effectiveness. Conspicuous cutaways meant to sow seeds of suspicion draw unneeded attention since everyone who isn’t Christine already is a possible accomplice in a conspiracy. Shots that focus on a particular person’s expression or a cup with a discolored substance seemingly worry the audience can’t catch on to what’s obvious. The lens also has a peculiarly pervy fascination for following Maggie Q from behind so her shorts-clad posterior often occupies center frame. “Death of Me” also includes a scene where Maggie Q rushes around her room in her underwear, just like she did in a bikini in “Fantasy Island” (review here) as though it’s the most unexpected contractual requirement conceivable.

VFX aren’t the best either. “Death of Me” includes more than one instance of eye trauma certain to make uncomfortable viewers squirm. But whenever digital enhancements have to make such moments work, they look like video game assets superimposed over live-action footage.

Although occasionally iffy coverage and spotty CGI put pimples on otherwise smooth skin, having veteran genre director Darren Lynn Bousman at the helm helps “Death of Me” achieve straightforward goals as a few-frills thriller. It’s a project engineered for journeymen to put together efficiently and economically, which is exactly how this cast and crew executes. “Death of Me” takes a page from Blumhouse’s book to produce a movie that gets enough presence out of a few recognizable actors and enough plot out of a simple premise. Flames of fear about overseas trips generally fan themselves, but films that go places like “Death of Me” does certainly add to that anxiety.

Review Score: 65

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