Pandemonium

No pun intended - the movie has quite the bleak outlook on (most) things. And it is quite tough on a lot of things too. You may not agree with what the movie is trying to tell you. Especially because it sort of feels like it starts off slow and fun in a way ... but really does take quite a few twists and turns. It does not care of what you expect and if you are sensitive ... things do happen (as they tend to do in life, no fair or whatever).

Our main character goes on a journey ... and it seems to end one way or another ... but does it really. And does it in the end? The movie does not take the easy way out, that is for sure. It did remind me a bit of the Silent Hill movie (20 years old or something now?) ... not the story, but the mood this creates. And the visuals to a degree .. you have to suspend your disbelief ... and not be too sensitive as I already stated above ... then you might find quite a few interesting things here ... not judging morally one way or the other ... or at least you should try not to.

I'm not usually one to write reviews, but I felt like I had to for this movie. The script was really well done from start to finish. I wouldn't call it a horror movie because it had so many realistic elements; it felt more like a spiritual journey we hope never to experience ourselves. The music and sounds added a scary element to the whole movie. I had to rewatch a few scenes to get a clear picture of what was happening, and I didn't regret doing so. Even though the movie is French, it captivated me from beginning to end. It's definitely worth watching, and I'll leave it at that so you can be surprised too.

Needless to say that I had never actually heard about this 2023 horror movie titled "Pandemonium" prior to stumbling upon it by random chance here in 2024. In fact, I didn't even know that it was a French movie that I sat down to watch when I opted to sit down and watch it, on account of it being a horror movie that I hadn't already seen.

So in a sense, writer and director Quarxx had every opportunity to entertain and impress me here. However, that was a wasted opportunity, because "Pandemonium" was a dumpster fire of a movie. I didn't know that I was in for a horror anthology here, and had I known that this was an anthology I wouldn't have wasted 95 minutes on watching it.

The movie was off to a great start with the scene with Nathan (played by Hugo Dillon) and Daniel (played by Arben Bajraktaraj) with the crash and the choices of Heaven or Hell. But then the movie quickly went downhill. But give it a watch, perhaps you might find the segments and stories interesting. I just happened to not find the subsequent segments interesting, after the first one.

It should be said, though, that the acting performances in "Pandemonium" were good. I wasn't familiar with a single actor or actress on the cast list, however. But that is actually something I do appreciate and enjoy when I sit down to watch a movie. Just a shame that this was a dumpster fire of a horror anthology.

Visually then "Pandemonium" was okay. There were a minimal of special effects throughout the 95 minutes that the movie ran for. But the effects were adequate for what they were and served the movie well enough.

"Pandemonium" didn't impress me, much less actually entertained me. And it is not a movie that will ever grace my screen a second time.

My rating of writer and director Quarxx's 2023 horror movie "Pandemonium" lands on a very generous three out of ten stars.

Pandemonium (2023, France), at face-value presents three ostensibly loose standing stories which all lead to almost everyone, fairly or unfairly, ending up in hell and going through a Dantesque process of suffering.

At this level the story engages questions around the moral values, if any, of those who "judge" humanity and as such the potential irrelevance of human existentialism.

There is also space for interpreting the film. An example of this flows mainly from the final aspect around the reincarnation of the Anti-Christ and the immediately preceding remarks around time being a human construct and not being linear. In each story we experience loss by the protagonist of family members in different ways, but there is always loss and there is always either direct or indirect guilt on the side of the protagonist. The argument for the stories thus dealing with reincarnation is not totally far-fetched and provides a solid thread to combine the stories into one larger story.

The cinematography was clearly influenced by writer and director Alexandre Claudin (Quarxx)'s artistic and atmospheric intent, inter alia demonstrated through the homage paid to various genres of horror films through the three stories.

The acting, especially by (at the time) ten year old Manon Maindevide, was top notch. The writing left obvious lacunae in the individual stories as well as the connecting story. Some might see this as a weakness in the film but it served an obvious purpose , both in relation to the main theme of existentialism / life-death-afterlife and the meaning (if any) thereof, as well as how the viewer gets his or her head around this theme, i.e. Through personal interpretation. Definitely a very unique film. 9/10.

After a devastating car accident, several survivors get up from the wreckage only to realize they are involved in an existential crisis over their past indiscretions coming back to haunt them, and after learning of the fates of several others like them must find a way to deal with their situation.

This was a highly disappointing and pretty underwhelming genre effort. The only aspect that really works well here is the initial setup and how it all starts which manages to bring about a highly effective use of chilling imagery to figure out what's going on. The whole idea of the characters being stuck in the afterlife with no idea themselves comes about rather well and the moody location offers the kind of intriguing starting point that gets this going on a high note. As well, with the way the films' approach to things includes a well-worn treatise on grief and the processing of trauma the way he comes across the other individuals who are stuck there like they are manages to be a highly effective setup that discusses the nature of sin in such a way as to be quite impressive overall. Beyond that, though, there's not a whole lot to say about this one since the structure of what's going on isn't all that enjoyable. This is due to the anthology structure present which makes very little sense for how it's incorporated. The inclusion in the middle of the film with very little warning that isn't that interesting beyond a one-note setup makes for some cliched stereotype setpieces to come about while only dealing with some rather bland and pedestrian themes. That they take up so much of the running time in the middle of the film offers up the kind of non-genre guilt trip that these stories are based on that it feels so shoehorned into this with the story of the murderous child being so confusing with where it takes place and how it all comes together with the imaginary friend that it's hard to enjoy it while the second story is barely genre-related at all about the bullied teen with so much of it about the mother's guilt for what happened. These aren't that interesting to watch and really just turn this off overall.

Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence and Graphic Language.