The Blackcoat's Daughter

February is a flawed film. It is also a fantastic film.

It takes place in the middle of a cold, snowy Canadian winter at an all-girls boarding school. The winter break is approaching and all the girls are picked up by their parents to spend a week at home. The exception is Kat (Kiernan Shipka), a very young girl whose parents don't show up and she begins to fear them dead, and Rose (Lucy Boynton), an older girl who has lied to her parents because she wanted to spend the break alone at the school. As time goes on, Kat gets more and more worried about her parents and acting stranger and stranger. Meanwhile, a couple of towns over, another young lady, Joan (Emma Roberts), escapes from a mental institution. She seems to be on the move toward the boarding school where the other two girls are. I would advise against seeing trailers or looking up anything further about the plot, this movie is best experienced with no preconceptions of the sub-genre or where it is going, because it leaves you most open to what it tries to do.

The magic of this movie is mostly in its extremely distinct mood, an almost undefinable aura or quality to it. All of the aspects of film making mirror the cold, snowy winter - music, the pace, the character interactions. The characters speak lazily, morbidly to each other, everything has a hint of cold tension underneath it. I've never seen a horror movie with this particular type of mood, and I always welcome unique experiences.

The script is also expertly crafted. I like how subtly the mystery is revealed to the viewer - it is not spoon-fed at any point, and it is quite well-concealed for at least the first half of the movie. We only get pieces that almost seem impossible to fit together, yet they come together in a perfectly obvious and coherent conclusion. On top of that, the story radiates an overwhelming sadness which elicited a very strong emotional response from me personally. Mostly due to Shipka's amazing acting, which stole every scene (the other two girls are great too, just overshadowed by the youngest cast member). She really captures the desolate emptiness required of her role.

The flaws are really mostly superficial, and a product of the fact that the movie was made by a relatively young cast. The director clearly has a good eye for morbid beauty, and he has made a movie that is much more artistic than the average horror, but I still found that some of his stylistic choices were cheesier and more generic than he seems to think they were. He's still a very talented guy, he just needs to find a more humble and grounded balance between innovation and reference. Still can't wait until he makes another horror though, I will definitely be following him!

Much appreciated. Sophisticated and subtle. Great job in the sound department.

Those who have not witnessed Kiernan Shipka's talent in "Mad Men" will surely find here some convincing material to make up their minds. The other two main actresses were also remarkable, however for exclusively aesthetic reasons, I must add.

Concerning the plot, I believe it is important to emphasize its non linear nature : a key element to reconstruct the overall "Stimmung".

I must criticize the trailer, despite having been convinced by it to approach the movie in the first place; the allusions to "erotic charge" are deeply misleading and cast a negative influence on the viewers, distracting them from the main, yet hidden, theme of the movie : the Occult. I rarely experienced a more discrete and effectively symbolic handling of such a complicated and debated matter. The way the Occult's first appearance on the scene is connected to the principal plot twist is also deeply satisfying. The final scenes also need to be focused on : they both bring the missing pieces in the plot and offer an open, surprising end.

My only critic would regard the excessive abundance of implicit hermeticism : some traits of the story could and should have been properly expanded (Kat's parents, some more details about Rose, a more complete view of the boarding school, the true origins of Kat's "sickness", just to make a few examples).

It's an ambitious movie, and early on the scenes underscore that the scenes will emphasize the unspoken, with long, uncomfortable pauses. Shot mostly at night, and in a nonlinear method, it's very confusing at first, and the ending doesn't provide the payoff you're hoping for. Some reviews here try to fill in the gaps the filmmaker left, and it's unfortunate that that's needed. There's talent on the screen, and it's been wasted. Near the end there's an attempt to explain the murky as Satanism, with the local priest doing an exorcism, which isn't the norm, but it's like so many films that sculpt a dark mystery without a clear path out. A bit dismaying in the end. The British call this Too Clever by Half, ie, failure.

Im glad I found this movie; unfortunately it had a limited release and there was not much buzz about it. So when I found it, I did not expect much. But I couldn't have been more wrong. Although there is not much originality, it was well done and made me uncomfortable!

The tone of the movie was dreadful and was beautifully supported by the score, the cinematography, and the acting. The pace of the movie was slow, but the payoff was excellent. No cheap jump scares, the right amount of gore, and a clever plot.

Horror fans should definitely give this movie a watch!

Longlegs was interesting enough that I feel compelled to work through Osgood Perkins' other four movies. Starting at the start, here's The Blackcoat's Daughter, sometimes called February (at least it was on YouTube). Neither title is very good. Also, the movie as a whole wasn't really my cup of tea either - not very good like its titles, but I also wouldn't go so far as to call it entirely bad.

It is, however, entirely too slow in my eyes. There is some occasional dread, and I think the music did quite a bit of the heavy lifting in terms of creating some sense of unease, but I was also so detached from most of it because it felt boring. I've had slower and more offbeat horror movies get to me before, but for whatever reason, it didn't happen here.

It's cool that it's going for something out there and I couldn't call it derivative, but I'm also pretty unenthusiastic about the experience of actually watching the thing.