GONZALEZ: 'PASSION' IS "A FIZZY SYMPHONY OF TERROR THAT COMMENTS ON PERSONALITY AS MEDIATED BY IMAGE RECORDING"
Doug Aarniokoski's Nurse 3D opened in theaters and on VOD last Friday, and several reviews have mentioned Brian De Palma. Here are some links:
Peter Sobczynski, RogerEbert.com
"If you ever wondered what the result might be if the screenplay for a Brian De Palma thriller somehow landed in the hands of the late, great Russ Meyer, Nurse 3D is the film for you. Director Douglas Aarniokoski and co-writer David Loughery have concocted a film that plays like an explosion in a warehouse of grindhouse film prints. Within the course of a mere 86 minutes, they jam in gallons of blood, ridiculously ripe performances, tons of beyond-purple dialogue (with the tone set early on when Abby narrates Danni's first encounter with a gory fatality with the instant classic 'She lost her virginity and the blood flowed') and so many scenes involving showers, locker rooms and fetishy outfits that it sometimes feels as if All Saints may be the first hospital to require a two-drink minimum along with proof of insurance."
Devin Faraci, Badass Digest
"If Brian De Palma had directed Nurse 3D it probably could have been something amazing. In the hands of Doug Aarniokoski it’s more of a campy delight. The film straddles the line between serious and silly in all the right ways, never being tongue-in-cheek but also not taking itself too seriously. The film was inspired by the photography of Lionsgate’s chief marketing officer Tim Palen, and every now and again there’s a composition so striking and so well-done that I wonder if Palen lent his eye on the day. A scene where Abbie watches Danni in the hospital shower is perfectly shot, as is one where two characters run down a spiral staircase. Many of the scenes between these gorgeous set pieces are flat (and like, really flat, a problem with a 3D movie), lit with garish reds and blues like Creepshow.
"But the movie is a blast. It’s absolutely over the top, and while it has real slow spots (like every single legit exploitation movie) by the end it is so crazy - Abbie goes on a pointless killing spree in the ICU during a chase - that you’ll be clapping and hollering, just like a grindhouse crowd in 1974. This is definitely a film to watch with a crowd (or at least some friends; the 3D is so useless that seeing it at home will make no difference. Also, it’s only playing in a handful of theaters), and it’s definitely a movie that could have a future as a midnight staple."
Frank Scheck, The Hollywood Reporter
"While the film might have been a guilty pleasure had it been made by the likes of Brian DePalma or Larry Cohen -- not to mention Abel Ferrara, whose similarly themed Ms. 45 is a classic of the genre -- director Doug Aarniokoski and co-screenwriter David Loughery fail to infuse the overly familiar elements with the necessary dark humor."
Ed Gonzalez, Slant
"No sense of moral complication arises from the elaborate and conspicuously far-from-evidence-free bloodbaths that Abby sets into motion against her pussy-blockers. Rather than capture truly pained souls tangled in exuberant horror tropes, the filmmakers settle for retrograde anguish and warmed-over artistry. This isn't idea-rich trash like Passion, a fizzy symphony of terror that commented on personality as mediated by image recording. Capturing evidence of Danni's accidentally cheating ways doesn't complicate Abby, only reveals her to be cut from the same crazy quilt as your garden-variety movie psychopath. Of course, that Nurse 3D suggests a worst-case-scenario gene splice of Orphan and Side Effects, which is to say it's exactly the film that Brian De Palma's naysayers think they see whenever they patronize one of the auteur's works, it at least succeeds in proving the adage that one man's trash is another's treasure."
Jason Shawhan, Nashville Scene
"Director/cowriter Douglas Aarniokoski has a gift for stylish sleaze. There’s one sequence involving a pas de deux on a spiral staircase that has all the elegance of Brian De Palma’s Dressed to Kill museum pursuit — and in 3D, it’s magnificent. There are also moments that flail about and thud against the walls of cheap studios. You never really know what exactly is going to happen visually, which certainly makes Nurse a different kind of suspense film."
Ryan Turek, Shock Till You Drop
"De La Huerta’s Abby Russell is a nurse by day and a man-eater by night until she meets Katrina Bowden’s Danni, who she develops an unhealthy relationship with – one that involves bad decisions, a three-way, photographs and blackmail. When Danni ultimately rejects Abby’s advances, the story takes a De Palma-esque turn and Abby begins to set Danni up for a string of murders."
Updated: Wednesday, February 12, 2014 5:19 PM CST
Post Comment | Permalink | Share This Post