Its a rare situation Im increasingly finding myself in with Author, Dreamweaver, Visionary + Actor, José Mojica Marins. The man known primarily for 'Coffin Joe' is (in my opinion) a VERY talented director and cinematographer. But Im SO badly struggling with his writing ability here, and his 3rd film to feature 'Coffin Joe', while an improvement over the last film, is still kind of faltering.
For a starters, there needs to be a bit of a context warning for anyone going into this film blind. José at this point had been slowly bringing his 'Coffin Joe' character to mainstream prevelance for the better part of 6 years. And at this point? 'Coffin Joe' was basically to Brazillian mainstream culture, what Freddy Kruger was to mainstream 80s culture.
Coffin Joe was EVERYWHERE, Comic books, lunchboxes, local appearences. TV...José both in and out of character would give interviews about the character, anecdotally mothers would threaten there children when they misbehaved by telling them that Coffin Joe would come and 'get' them. He was quickly becoming a household name, and a controversial one at that.
The reason I mention this is because 'The Awakening of the Beast' kind of...transitions Coffin Joe away from the character we knew, and into something a little more nebulous. In 'Midnight' and 'Possess' we see that Coffin Joe is pretty much just a regular guy who, through communicating with the spirits of hell has been given enhanced strength and agility. and the mission to preserve his bloodline by having a son by an equally perfect woman. He has a few campy 'evil' moments...but he supernatural factor is minimal.
Here though? Coffin Joe is seemingly existing in either Hell, or some kind of astral plaine, summoned as and when required. I assume its Hell based on the fact that, in this film, whenever he appears, the film turns to colour...and it only did that last time in 'Possess' when they went to Hell.
Assuming it IS hell, Coffin Joe is a master of the domain. able to summon the damned on command, control armies and teleport anywhere he wants and pretty much do anything (again; think the dreamworld scenes from the nightmare on elm street movies) He's no longer just a slightly creepy molesty bloke. He's basically a full blown demon by this point.
And thats quite the shift, as he was initially a character that believed that Mans power could outstrip ANY other power earthly or otherwise...Seemingly now though he's accepted that demon powers are cooler.
Anyway; so this is another 'Anthology' entry. I found it a little bit confusing truthfully...But my understanding is that we get 3 anthology stories dealing with people engaging in lewd, debauched or hideous acts...and then the final story brings 1 character from each of the previous stories + 1 new one into a finale in which a doctor drugs them up on LSD to document what happens...and the answer is, absolute chaos and the return of Coffin Joe.
And its here really that I find my struggles with Marins work beginning to crystalize. Because; I have NO idea what ACTUALLY happened in this film. Apart from the final part of the anthology where they LITERALLY spell out whats happening. the other stories are seemingly just an excuse to get people naked and doing debauched acts such as molestation or extreme 'insertions'.
all of this is framed around a group of doctors, psychiatrists and José himself discussing theses 'cases' and decrying them as perverse.
and...thats all there is, its confusing, rambly, overly long for the most part, the acts seemingly just melt into one another without rhyme or reason, most of the scenes are silent or consist of just...noises...the tone is all over the place...at one point the film basically stops to just discuss how successful Coffin Joe is (which...is a bit self congratulatory, lets be honest...)
Theres little structure in a narrative sense and it felt really quite offputting to me. But then, contrasting that...Marins is seemingly experimenting here with film, the presentation of film and narrative, and visuals broadly speaking.
and while the actual story, and its execution may be a bit naff (in my opinion) what is SHOWN on screen are the clear trademarks of a film maker finding his voice, seeking out new frontiers and crafting there own cinematic language. In that sense, this films insane and really quite impressive.
Marins continues his trend of working in Black and white film, and...once again, the directions gorgeous, its rich, creative. he really manages to capture the chaos of a bad drug trip quite well. the lighting at this point has been mastered in terms of his shadow work and how to capture the subjects.
His language and usage of film is aggressive and assertive, which is very bold and striking, especially for a film maker only 4 mainstream pictures into his career. He has a confidence around his own ability that is honestly really quite impressive.
When the film DOES swap over to colour, its refreshing, it feels like the films turned a corner and we get to see him RE-explore the medium with coloured lighting gels, more emphasis on composition and the visuals themselves rather than relying on the shadow play and more horror-centric tools to create atmosphere.
As an experimental piece its really quite incredible. Your watching a director who clearly has a keen eye for visuals and isnt afraid to experiment with the medium of film explore said medium in realtime. and for all its pitfalls, its successes payback twice over.
The performances are all rock solid here too, there some great campy/demented physical work on hand and everyones playing big, with plenty of running around and set/prop work. Even the soundtrack seems to have had an upgrade. Its definitely a step in the right direction.
Its rare that I find a director who's SO interesting visually as José Mojica Marins...but at the same time is struggling SO much to give me a story I actually honestly care about...barring a 3rd act twist in this thing, I couldnt give a tinkers fig about the plot of this movie...I literally had ZERO investment in it. But to see someone so passionately visualise whatever plot he was trying to produce? well...its a testimony to the man that I may not like what he said, but I liked how he said it.
I live in hope that future entries garner stronger scripts...or, in a merciful world, that he gets to direct SOMEONE ELESES scripts...Because I see STRONG promise at this point in his work. I just need a A+ script to help drive it home.
Oh...and this is worth checking out if you like arthouse cinema this is basically José Mojica Marins 'Godard' phase. You wont have a clue whats REALLY happening. But you'll appreciate the ride.
source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/the-awakening-of-the-beast/
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