September 17, 2018
Written by: Richard Bates Jr., Mark Bruner
Starring: Matthew Gray Gubler, Kat Dennings, Ray Wise
Quote: "It's nothing fifteen or twenty drinks won't fix."
Trivia: Most of the initial cast (including Ray Wise, Jeffrey Combs, Jack Plotnick and Mackenzie Phillips) made guest appearances on the show Criminal Minds (2005), which co-stars Matthew Gray Gubler.
Suburban Gothic is writer/director Richard Bates Jr.'s followup to 2012's Excision. I watched and wrote about Excision a few months ago. It is an incredibly dark look at mental illness and the difficulty of not "fitting in." Plus it has some of the most repulsive scenes in film. In Suburban Gothic, Bates is once again looking at suburban life and the struggle to find one's place in a world that makes no sense, this time as a person in their early twenties. Unlike Excision, Suburban Gothic is a much, much lighter film with a lot of genuinely funny moments and without the unrestrained use of blood and gore (bummer). Matthew Gray Gubler does a tremendous job bringing his character Raymond to life as he struggles to find a purpose in the suburban world that he has no connection to. As if being stuck between childhood and adulthood isn't bad enough, Raymond must also navigate the paranormal world when he discovers that his parents' house is haunted. It is the writing that makes the film a success. The ghosts are secondary to the dialogue and characters which really drive the film.
The film begins with Raymond graduating college with an MBA but being forced to move back to his hometown and into his parents house after not being able to find a job. At home he continually argues with his father (Ray Wise... who killed Laura Palmer?), who is a fairly racist football coach. The father spends the film looking down on anything Raymond says or does and continually reminding him of what a disappointment he is. Raymond also keeps bumping into people who went to high school with him who make a point to remind him of what a fat loser he used to be and how he thought he could talk to ghosts. Raymond, for his part, makes no attempt to fit into the small town culture and instead chooses to wear clothes the townies think is weird and also has a sarcastic quip for anyone he meets. Neither of which help him to make friends until he meets Becca, the tough bartender who becomes his partner in fighting the paranormal and the love interest (they kind of shove this in there at the end).
Now you are probably wondering, what about the ghosts? It takes a while to get there but eventually the body of a girl is unearthed in Raymond's parents' backyard which stirs up its spirit. The ghosts possesses one of his father's gardeners and terrorizes Raymond. Eventually, Raymond and Becca uncover the mystery of who the girl was and Raymond discovers that the heart rate medication he has been taking since high school were actually antipsychotics which is why he hasn't been able to speak to ghosts since then. In the end, Raymond and Becca make everything right with the ghost, they make out, and everyone lives happily ever after.
The character of Raymond makes for a really great fish out of water story. He could not have anything less in common with the town he grew up in. He wears a robe to the local bar (where he almost gets beat up... a couple times), he slam dances at the bar (to the jeers of "you suck" afterwards), he eccentricities are mistaken as homosexuality by the townies, and he does nothing to hide his extensive vocabulary. It is obvious he has nothing but disdain for his fellow locals but with a sense of shame that despite his intelligence and "getting out", he is right where they are.
The other character that really makes the film is the father. I guess he could be considered "old school" in that he is not politically correct (so much so that much of his dialogue comes off as ignorantly racist) and values manliness above all else (of which Raymond is diametrically opposed). At a award ceremony for the football team he tells one of the players that "he's like the son I never had." He also apologizes, in all seriousness, to two black players for not getting any grape soda. There is another moment in the film after Raymond causes a commotion when a ghost tries to attack him that he storms into the room to declare, "if you interrupt your mom giving me a blowjob again, there is going to be hell to pay." Classy.
On that subject, legendary director John Waters makes a cameo as the historical society president who receives the bones of the girl from Raymond's father. Waters character is unwilling to part with the bones so Becca makes a blowjob motion with her hand asking if there is anything they can do. Waters instead looks to Raymond, asking "what about him?" to both their surprise.
Even Jeffrey Combs (the Reanimator movies) makes a cameo as the family doctor who hates Raymond's dad. He refuses to treat him and reveals that it is not heart medication Raymond is taken, all to spite the father who he claims, "is a dick."
The movie received some flack for lacking in the horror department. The horror aspects of the film do take a while to get into and when they do arrive seem to be largely an afterthought. While the ghosts terrify Raymond, they are ultimately unfulfilling for the audience. A screaming head and a couple of ghostly images aren't enough to make this ghost story satisfying. The ending is also anti-climatic. A necklace is thrown into a coffin and the ghost disappears. Next, Raymond and Becca, out of nowhere, makeout whereas previously their relationship was more of a buddy comedy. The romance appears shoehorned into the ending.
Although barely a horror movie, it is still a very fun film. The dialogue, the acting, and the cameos make the movie worth your time. Just do not go in expecting a horror movie or anything resembling Excision. If you drop those expectations, you'll like the film just fine.
...what's your thoughts?
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