After years of creating films
that defied the big-studio cookie cutter, such as "Leaving Las Vegas"
and "Timecode," maverick director Mike Figgis makes his most
unpredictable move yet, shooting a conventional, predictable thriller.
"Cold Creek Manor" features Sharon Stone and
Dennis Quaid as the Tilsons, a married couple who leave the city after one of
their two children nearly dies in a car accident. But the "quiet"
country isn't such a peaceful retreat when volatile ex-con Dale Massie (Stephen
Dorff) comes to seek work at his former family home, Cold Creek Manor.
Marketed as a spookfest by Touchstone Pictures,
Figgis's film skates a supernatural line, never promising, but hinting at,
ghostly infestation. The director uses this tension to suck us in, carrying us
through a carefully constructed first act full of eerie child rhymes about
"Hammerhand" coming to "throw you down the devil's throat."
"Cold Creek Manor" possesses almost all the hallmarks of a horror
movie. Moss-covered, cobweb-laced mansions have long been a staple of terror
tales. Figgis fills his manor up quickly, bending the camera around dark
doorways and dusty rooms as the Tilsons make it their home.
It's here that Figgis gets issue-oriented. All good
horror films are part social commentary, and while most slasher flicks coast on
an undercurrent of teen angst surrounding acceptance and sexuality, thrillers
are propelled by the concerns of an older set. "Cold Creek Manor"
deals with rural gentrification. As small towns die, new money comes in from the
city to restore houses for second family homes or midlife relocations. In
Figgis's vision, the feared clash with locals boils to the surface, especially
in the town café, where Dale accuses Cooper Tilson (Quaid) of buying the
property out from under him while he was in jail. When filmmaker Cooper decides
to create a documentary about his new home's history, Dale feels as if his house
and even his own life have been trespassed. The Tilsons discover that "hell
is other people" (as Nietzsche wrote) when Dale becomes more violent and
vindictive.
What separates "Cold Creek Manor" from other
chillers is Figgis's artful direction - watch as the manor comes into focus
through a spider web strung between flowers - and a firmly planted sense of
story reality. Very few scenes invoke the audience's knee-jerk reaction of
"don't go in there!"
The Tilsons are smart, logical people and act
accordingly - as we hope we might act in similar situations. Figgis's
reality-based narrative bonds us to his characters and their actions, and his
actors deliver meaty, grounded performances. At the first sign of danger, Cooper
sends his wife and kids far away from it. No one decides to take a shower when
the lights go out, no one checks the back yard alone. Even when the Tilsons need
to investigate a dark crevasse, they don't charge in with a flashlight that
constantly blinks out. They send a video camera on a rope.
The result is a logical, emotionally resonant thriller.
True, there might be fewer actual scares. (In fact there is one ridiculous,
manufactured sequence in which snakes seem to simultaneously attack each member
of the family in different rooms.) But Figgis takes no cheap shots, uses no
spiked-volume soundtrack to make us jump. Perhaps he proves his
unconventionality with "Cold Creek Manor" after all, creating a
thriller without resorting to the genre's usual bag of tricks. It's a noble
attempt, although Figgis could have ratcheted up the stakes and scares by at
least cutting open the bag before discarding it.
