STRANGE DARLING Flips Script on Serial Killer Movies
Strange Darling, Image Courtesy JT MollnerThe description for the Strange Darling screening at Fantastic Fest was just one line: “One day in the twisted love life of a serial killer.” So, of course, I had to see it.
What followed is a twisty, turny take on the cat-and-mouse thriller trope that is lusciously shot and seductive to the end. In one of the best performances I’ve seen since Pearl, Willa Fitzgerald plays a woman who meets a nice guy (Kyle Gallner) at a bar, and the two head to a hotel. But that’s about as far as I can get in the plot without completely spoiling the fun of watching this unexpected exploration into gender, murder, and power.
Women live on a constant edge, always aware of violence creeping in from all sides. Women’s desire is carefully managed by society. In most cases, the power play sex can be usually ends in violence against women. But women are rarely killers. That distinction lies with men, who, as of 1990 made up 85% of the serial killers in the US (Hunting Humans: An Encyclopedia of Modern Serial Killers). Yet whatever the gender, serial killers still fascinate us.
Horror that sharply manages the viewer’s expectations has always been some of my favorite films. Mollner does a fantastic job of holding the viewer out on a plank, asking them to look down, and then kicking them overboard. The film is structured in six parts, but those parts do not necessarily come in order, creating a non-linear story that reveals its secrets in satisfying pieces.
Shot on 35mm film, Strange Darling shines in its cinematography, feeling somehow like a 70s slasher mixed with a contemporary arthouse flick vibe worthy of a studio like A24. The film utilizes slow zooms that are reminiscent of Kubrick’s The Shining (1980), but they don’t feel overwrought because the focus is female rage, a topic rarely explored in horror in nuanced ways. As Mollner called it, the “candy-coated” Anamorphic format (a term for shooting widescreen on 35mm film) results in some stunning sequences.
The film also shines in its soundtrack. The original music was created by indie rock artist Z Berg specifically for the film. Since most of the songs are unfamiliar to the viewer, they give the film an atmosphere that pales in comparison to most contemporary horror.
Both Willa Fitzgerald and Kyle Gallner provide truly outstanding performances, and the two have a chemistry that pulls the story along to where as a viewer, you can’t wait for them to collide again and again as they bounce back and forth between kills.
Willa Fitzgerald is endlessly watchable. In some portions of the film, she is almost unrecognizable to other scenes, her face shifting to shift the viewer’s expectations. The end scene is particularly moving, a long shot akin to the ending of Pearl. If this is the new trope for female leads in horror movies, I’m down.
This is one you’ll want to go in without knowing much about and stick along for the bumpy, blood-filled ride. Someone get this film to the big screens, ASAP!
Image Courtesy Chris BilheimerThis article is part of Interstellar Flight Magazine’s coverage of Fantastic Fest , taking place in Austin, TX, 9/21–9/28, 2023. We thank Fantastic Fest and Alamo Drafthouse for providing access to these films!
Queer disability fantasy poetry from Ennis Rook BasheInterstellar Flight Magazine publishes essays on what’s new in the world of speculative genres. In the words of Ursula K. Le Guin, we need “writers who can see alternatives to how we live now, can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies to other ways of being, and even imagine real grounds for hope.” Visit our Patreon to join our fan community on Discord. Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.
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