Frailty (2001)
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Adam and Fenton are brothers who have just been woken up by their dad who claims he was visited by an angel and has been given the task of killing demons on earth, masquerading as humans. He needs their help to do this. 1 of the boys believes in his dad, the other thinks his dad has gone insane. But the more “demons” dad brings home, the more one of the kids is going to have to make a stand or get out of the way.
Overall: Definitely a must-see for thriller fans. The movies works on many levels but the best part of the movie is it never tries to convince you that the dad is crazy. I think the movie works well because it basically puts out the idea of “what if the dad really did see this and everyone else is crazy?” I like that and the movie worked well to play with the viewer and let the viewer get out of it, what they wanted to. Haven’t you ever wondered about people who claim they are Jesus? No one believes them but what if one of them was actually Jesus himself? What if the “Son of God” came down and ended up in a “12 Monkeys” sort of situation sitting in an asylum? This film runs with that theme of “what if the guy really saw an angel?” I’m not a big McConaughey fan since I can think of a ton more movies I hated him in than those I thought he did a good job on. But this film bolsters my faith in him and reaffirms that Bill Paxton has some great ideas (“A Simple Plan”). Go see this folks! There are 8 minutes of deleted scenes on the dvd, most of which were sorta borderline for me. Would have been ok if left in but without them the film is just as good. Comparison: 12 Monkeys meets Radio Flyer 04/2004: Well if you thought that movies like this were not very "realistic," then take the case of Deanna Laney. Deanna killed 2 of her 3 kids by stoning them to death. Deanna is a Pentecostal and as such interprets the Bible literally and believes that God is infallible. She also believed she was right to kill her children because God would never order her to do wrong. So an East Texas jury was told that she admitted killing her kids but still pled "Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity." And the jury believed her and acquitted her. And now she will be hospitalized for mental illness. Was this just a really good ploy to "beat" the system? Or is she just truly insane? Or did God really ask her to kill her kids? P.S.: Andrea Yates was convicted of killing all 5 of her kids by drowning them in a bathtub by a Texas jury in 2001. She claims that she should be found not guilty by reason of insanity because Satan ordered her to kill her kids. If Satan said so, she must be insane. But in Yates' case, the Jury concluded that if she believed Satan ordered her to kill, she must have known it was wrong. They also saw Yates' attempts to conceal her murder plans as a sign that she knew it was wrong. As brutal as both cases were, it may have been easier for jurors to stomach beating children to death than drowning them. Stoning has an obvious biblical significance and the beatings were over relatively quickly. But Yates had to hold each child under water an average of three minutes — longer for those who came up for air. P.P.S.: On January 6, 2005, the Texas Court of Appeals reversed the Yates convictions, because California psychiatrist and prosecution witness Dr. Park Dietz admitted he had given materially false testimony during the trial. Dietz stated that shortly before the killings, an episode of Law & Order had aired featuring a woman who drowned her children and was acquitted of murder by reason of insanity. It was later discovered that no such episode existed; the appellate court held that the jury may have been influenced by his false testimony and that thus a new trial would be necessary. On January 9, 2006, Yates again entered pleas of not guilty by reason of insanity. On July 26, 2006, after three days of deliberations, Yates was found not guilty by reason of insanity, as defined by the state of Texas. Whichever way you look at these cases and this film, the fact is, these people believed that someone told them killing was ok. However can we dismiss as lunacy the fact that God or the Devil did tell them to kill? How is it that God allows us to create "weapons of mass destruction" and use them on each other but can't tell individuals who should die at their hands? Don't dismiss this film by the plot...it is more plausible than it may first seem. |
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