One thing that I’ve always been proud of is the fact that I was a Kristen Stewart fan way before Twilight. I’ve always said I have a knack for recognizing a star way before they become a household name, and when I was in middle school, I knew for a fact that Stewart was going to be one. You might be reading along right now and thinking that I came to this conclusion because of her performance in David Fincher’s 2002 heist thriller Panic Room, which is fair—it’s a near-perfect, grossly underrated movie. But no, the movie that convinced 12-year-old me that Stewart was destined for greatness was the 2007 haunted-farmhouse movie The Messengers, which I had forgotten about until I was browsing Tubi this week.
Much like when I revisited Dead Silence a few months ago to determine if it was actually a bad film (spoiler: it’s complicated!) I decided—partially because I had a lung infection, partially because I’m not immune to nostalgia—to watch in order to figure out why we all forgot about it.
The Messengers was directed by Danny and Oxide Pang (The Eye) and produced by none other than Sam Raimi. Stewart stars alongside John Corbett, Dylan McDermott, and a pre-Schitt’s Creek Dustin Milligan. It’s got a generic but adequately creepy setting. I remember the marketing being in CosmoGirl magazine. So what happened? Was The Messengers too ahead of its time, not scary enough to leave a lasting impression, or simply another victim of the crowded so-called “torture porn” and remake-heavy horror boom of the early 2000s? So, as I did with Dead Silence, I want to share what I loved and what I didn’t on this rewatch.
Before we begin, though, a quick rundown of the plot: Five years after a family is brutally murdered by an unknown entity in their remote farmhouse in North Dakota, the Solomons—husband Roy (McDermott), wife Denise (Penelope Ann Miller), teenage daughter Jess (Stewart) and mute toddler son Ben (twins Evan and Theodore Turner) move in with the hope of starting fresh and running a sunflower farm. But they quickly discover there’s a darkness still lurking in their home, intent on tearing the already vulnerable family apart.
The Good
The Messengers opens with a bang—a mother tries to calm her young son while packing their things, reminding him that everything is going to be okay. Of course, we all know that’s not the case. We watch as an unseen entity kills her and her children, something I had 1.) completely forgotten about and 2.) didn’t expect from a film that was advertised in my teen magazines (The Messengers is rated PG-13). The film immediately establishes a sense of danger and dread. If the Pang brothers are willing to show us a mother and her children being brutalized, what else are they willing to show us? How far are they going to push our boundaries? These questions linger in the back of our minds as we are introduced to the Solomon family, whom we meet as they’re driving from Chicago to an undisclosed location in North Dakota.
Immediately, we get the sense that the family is still healing from something traumatic, a fact revealed carefully over its tight 90-minute runtime. Stewart is really carrying the film as Jess, a moody teenager who is trying her best to be a good sister and daughter and adjust to her new environment. Stewart haters will say that Jess is just a proto-Bella Swan, and sure, some of their mannerisms are similar, but Jess is angsty (and rightfully so), guarded, and unconvinced that the family can just leave the past behind. She’s also protective and warm, paying more attention to Ben than her mother ever does. It was easy to root for Jess, mostly because I saw so much of my younger self in her.
Jess also effortlessly sinks a jump shot 30 seconds into meeting her love interest, Bobby (Milligan), a totally straight and not at all gay thing to do. Happy Pride?
The Bad
It pains me to say it, but this took me two nights to finish, not because I was busy (again: sick), or because it was hard to watch, but because, despite its atmosphere and Stewart’s performance, The Messengers is boring. I knew when I pressed play that this would be full of clichés—I’m not expecting anything particularly groundbreaking from your standard “family moves into a big, obviously haunted house for a fresh start” film, but The Messengers really brings very little to the table that we haven’t seen before. The scares aren’t effective, even though they have all the potential to be. In fact, there were quite a few moments that reminded me of The Conjuring, a film that takes a similar premise and dials it up to 100.
I think part of the problem here is the lack of urgency. We get this wonderful cold open followed by a whole lot of nothing. We see signs of paranormal activity, but they don’t quite register to any of the family members. Even Ben, the first to notice that something in lurking in the halls, doesn’t react fearfully. He seems delighted that a corpse is crawling across the ceiling, so of course, nobody reacts or wonders what the toddler could possibly be staring at.
This brings me to something I discovered as I was researching the film: it actually had its start as a script called The Scarecrow by screenwriter Todd Farmer (Jason X, My Bloody Valentine 3D). Originally, it was meant to be a psychological thriller following a family whose farm is facing financial problems. The father decides to put up a scarecrow in order to protect his crops and hopefully turn things around. Suddenly, people start getting killed. The father believes the murders might have something to do with the scarecrow, but it’s later revealed that it was him all along.
This is a way more compelling script than the one that was used for The Messengers, and as I was reading, I thought about how cool it would have been if we got this movie instead. What we have in its place is a generic film in a generic setting with an unsatisfying twist and very few scares.
The Verdict
If you want a walk down memory lane and want to watch a very 2007-coded movie, then by all means, check this out on Tubi. But it’s obvious why The Messengers didn’t stand the test of time. I wonder if the original script was used instead, would we have remembered this movie? Would it have been considered a cult classic? There’s a prequel called Messengers 2: The Scarecrow, but I’m not sure if I’m willing to put myself through more family farm-related hauntings. I think I’m just going to rewatch Panic Room again.
Categorized:Editorials