The Harbinger

On one level, this quite excellent film might be compared to "A Nightmare on Elm Street." City denizen "Mavis" contacts her old friend "Monique," who lives in a semi-rural enclave upstate. Mavis requests that Mo travel to her apartment for undisclosed, but serious, reasons.

When Mo arrives at the apartment, she learns that Mavis has been plagued by bad dreams that are increasingly violent and threaten to literally erase her, as if she had never existed. Key to these dreams, we learn, is a dark figure that controls the direction of the dream-narrative, as it were. Mo tries to help. But in so doing, she falls prey to the very dream "disease" that Mavis fell prey to. Much of the movie's balance, then, is concerned with Mo's dream world and her ideations.

On the other hand, the deep structure of the film is actually close to something like "It's a Wonderful Life" (or, heck, "Wild Strawberries"). The questions at the heart of it all: What if I depart now? What if I had never been? Erasure. We learn that these questions were already pertinent to Monique's life prior to her own "infection" by these disturbing dreams. But these questions also inform the general direction of a film that uses the isolation, impersonality and fear of the COVID 19 crisis as its backdrop and sensibility. In short, The Harbinger has ambitions beyond "the creepy."

To the extent the film meets these ambitions, Gabby Beans (Monique) deserves a lot of credit for carrying the central role from stern to bow. She is excellent. (Frankly, each of the actors was, at worst, very good.)

Mitton's writing also deserves a lot of credit. There are a few slow moments in the middle of the film. But in general, the Harbinger features tight, economical dialogue between the actors. And while the script owes more than one debt to its predecessors, it also avoids most of the expected horror movie cliches for a film in this genre (dream horror?), while playing on some familiar tropes (key among them, the "is the character imagining this, or is she really experiencing it" plot device).

Anyway, definitely recommended. Oh, and the closing scene was very well done in my opinion. A fine closer right up there with "Kingdom of the Spiders" or "Hereditary."

Covid wasn't a horror for the majority and this film tries to make lockdown seem like one. The actors do their best with what has become a boring subject and the two points are for their performances alone. But as an entertaining horror, it fails abysmally with all the cliches of a horror that relies solely upon atmosphere with a boring subject. There aren't many actors due to when it was made and rules. 2020-2022 will go down as filmmakers worst efforts for making films and this film is testament to that fact. I honestly cannot think of any film made during the covid period that is excellent. It's as if they continued making drivel throughout that period thinking lockdown would never end and the public would be grateful for anything. Yawn fest.

I am not really sure how to rate this movie. I tried to watch it last week but I fell asleep even though I wasn't tired. I thought that the movie was boring up onto that point and that that was the reason. Anyway yesterday I tried watching it again and I fell asleep once again so I watched the rest of the movie this morning and I have to say that I was really bored most of the time.

There's a good movie hidden in there and the basic concept is really interesting but the movie is struggling with pacing issues and a plot that is mostly boring with few standout scenes. It's a metaphor about Covid and what it did to people but honestly I think that this whole thematic is not that relevant anymore and kind of sucked dry.

If a movie with a story like this and some faster pacing would have been released two or three years ago I think it would have worked better. By watching the ratings I see that there are some people who enjoyed this movie, so I am not trying to convince you not to watch it but for me personally it's just didn't work. [3,5/10]

One plot is the horror part, which is fairly interesting. The Harbinger is an interesting enemy, and the parts dealing with this were pretty well done. It wasn't particularly scary though, which might be because of the second plot in this movie. It's essentially rubbing in the Covid-19 pandemic scare tactics that we were all subjected to back in 2020. That heavily rubbed in your face sub-plot just ruined it for me. Most of us know better than to believe the propaganda, so now it just seems absurd how horrified these people were of this virus. I finally just fast forwarded to see the ending, because I just couldn't put up with it anymore. I figure that the main characters are mentally the same type of people that wear masks diligently to this day, and even when they are alone in their vehicles. Absolutely hilarious.

This is a movie that will age like a good wine. Maybe it's too soon for some. The pandemic is still too much on our minds, there are things we prefer not to relive and it brings us anxiety. However, it has much more to say about the memories we leave in the world - or the fear of not leaving them - than just about the pandemic itself (in fact, it parallels those times so well that it didn't need so many direct references, falling a bit in overexposing that and being too much on the nose).

I'm afraid that the number of dreams in the film might turn off some viewers, but this is a film about dreams (or nightmares) and that's where the film lives. Think of Nightmare on Elm Street and think that here the fears that plague us while we rest also kill us. Perhaps because we are/were not really resting.

Many other themes are being explored (trauma, family, friends, support, fake news, isolation, depression...), but more importantly, the film never forgets to be a horror film, with very tense scenes, effective enough to have me clinging to my chair - the last one culminating in a brilliantly effective jump scare. Even when everything looks good, we must not let our guard down, and we must not stop fighting, because it is when we relax that we are most vulnerable. Great acting by Gabby Beans who is going to be a star.